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Megachurch Burnout: Why The Protestant Gentleman is Leaving the Non-Denominational Church | Reaction
Jeremy Jeremiah, Orthodox Christian, and host of today's Cloud of Witnesses episode, reacts and responds to Dillon Baker of The Protestant Gentleman podcast (https://www.youtube.com/@theprotestantgentleman) testimony that he, Dillon, is leaving the Non-Denominational church, and why.
What if the Sunday you know has drifted far from the church you need? We follow a thoughtful journey out of a non-denominational megachurch toward a rooted, reverent, and sacramental vision of Christian life. The conversation starts with authority and structure: why do so many churches teach different things, and who decides? From sola scriptura to elder boards with conflicting interpretations, we unpack how fragmentation becomes normal when there’s no visible, historic body to anchor doctrine and practice.
We trace the journey out of a non-denominational megachurch toward a historic, sacramental, and accountable expression of the church. Along the way we examine authority, discipleship, pastoral care, reverence, and why communion belongs at the center.
• identifying fragmentation born of solo interpretation and weak structures
• contrasting seeker models with worship for the baptized
• reclaiming the pastor as present shepherd, not executive
• rejecting a popular gospel that mutes sin and judgment
• restoring reverence through sacred space, symbols, and creeds
• embracing participatory liturgy over passive consumption
• naming the limits of unformed community group leadership
• elevating communion and baptism as the church’s heartbeat
• counting the relational cost of leaving and discerning next steps
• inviting conversation about apostolic continuity and unity
From there, we move into discipleship and the true purpose of Sunday. If church is designed as a seeker venue, believers become spectators and the gospel gets softer. We make the case that the gathered church should be for the baptized—shaping souls through confession, accountability, and the ordinary disciplines that form resilient Christians. That priority reframes the pastor’s role from CEO to shepherd and challenges the assumption that charismatic leadership and scalable programs equal spiritual health.
Reverence takes center stage as we explore the power of sacred space, ancient hymns, creeds, and participatory liturgy. This isn’t about aesthetics; it’s about recognizing the holiness of God and recovering practices that have carried the church for centuries. The climax lands on the sacraments, especially communion. We consider the real presence, why the Lord’s Table once stood at the heart of worship, and what is lost when a sermon becomes the main event. Along the way, we count the cost of leaving a beloved community and open a path toward unity with a church that offers accountability, depth, and apostolic continuity.
If you’re wrestling with megachurch hype, soft preaching, or surface fellowship, this conversation offers a map back to depth and stability. Listen, share with a friend, and then tell us: what anchors your worship—stage or altar? Subscribe for more thoughtful, tradition-aware conversations and leave a review to help others find the show.
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Please leave a comment with your thoughts!
Why am I leaving non-denominationalism overall? And as I've gone through this journey, I have felt uh specific things that I could not uh put to the wayside anymore.
SPEAKER_00:I have heard your other videos, I follow your content, I know you want unity, right? You want to bring the Protestant church back together.
SPEAKER_01:The structure of the church is super important. The structure and the authority of where you get your information, and then also having some type of accountability on top of that structure.
SPEAKER_00:Because Christ established a visible church on earth, gentlemen. He established it himself 2,000 years ago.
SPEAKER_01:The worship says we have put so much priority on these songs that are, again, feminine, they focus on emotion, and they're not really that reverent.
SPEAKER_00:He even said in this video, maybe the non-denominational movement should just go away is the only way to actually have a sustaining model. And that church has existed by the laying out of hands from one bishop and priest and dig into the next. Hey everybody, this is Dylan Baker. He's a Protestant leaving the non-denominational church. We're going to get into this today. Let's go.
SPEAKER_01:Leaving my non-denominational megachurch. And even more specifically, why am I leaving non-denominationalism overall? Now.
SPEAKER_00:Now, Dylan, I want to say first and foremost that I respect you very much. I've been following your channel for a little while now. I think you and I have even spoken briefly over Instagram. Um, you've got a great ministry, and I I I love the journey that you're on. You have become dissatisfied with the non-denominational um movement, which is what we're going to talk about today in your video, where you explain your reasons why. And we will talk hopefully about where you're headed. I will tell you quickly in background for the audience listening to this right now. I myself was raised in a non-denominational uh home. I went to a non-denominational, it was Baptist by name, but in practice, it was a non-denominational private Christian school for 15 years. Um, it was later in my life I then became a reformed Presbyterian uh before becoming an Orthodox Christian. So I feel that I do have something to say here, uh, given Dylan's um discussion here and his journey. I'm really looking forward to seeing how this goes, and I hope that you guys enjoy. Dylan is a very thoughtful individual. You'll see that he puts a lot of time and effort into his content, and I really respect that. You can see he's got a great looking studio. Uh, but it's not just that. Uh he he is a thoughtful uh gentleman, and his channel is actually called the Protestant Gentleman. Um, so without further ado, here we go.
SPEAKER_01:This is a video that I do not make lightly. This is something that I have been thinking and praying about for a long time and been very cautious to make a video on because I want to be as clear and concise as possible, biblical as possible, while not slandering some of the things that I've seen in the non-denominational church, but also being very truthful and very transparent about what I'm experiencing and what are some of the things that I'm even hearing around me on a consistent basis. And so this does not come with a light heart, but a very heavy heart. And so before I get into some of the points that I want to make, I want to give you a little bit about my background so you could see how much our paths might cross and maybe we're experiencing the exact same things.
SPEAKER_00:Amen. I'm here for it.
SPEAKER_01:But I did not grow up in the church. Uh, I got saved much later on in life, but I started in a non-denominational church. Going forward, I'm gonna say in D for non-denominationalism, uh, just to speed up the process. But the N D world is really good at a couple things, and all of us would admit evangelism is something they prioritize. And I'm a product of that. I got uh saved in college through a non-denominational ministry and spent a ton of time in the college ministry at a non-denominational church.
SPEAKER_00:I want to say as well, I myself um was saved, if you will, became a Christian, I would say, um, initially as a non-denominational person. Um, I went down for numerous, I've talked about it in other videos, numerous altar calls. Um, many times in the non-denominational circles I was in, Calvary Chapel, Costa Mesa. I went to that private school in Huntington Beach, California, and we had altar calls very regularly. Um, I would go to the harvest fests, right? The um Greg Laurie's uh, you know, big evangelism um outreach things that would happen at major stadiums. You know, I went down uh and prayed with the prayer counselors, you know, on a few occasions and tearfully gave my life to Christ. Yet again, uh I went through all of that. And I want to say that not even uh disparagingly in all ways. Uh it was very real at the time. I felt very sincere about my faith. Um, and I will say too that my own parents, um, they were converted during the Jesus Revolution movement of the 60s and 70s, which is where non-denominationalism really was birthed. Um, and so I feel very connected to that movement. Um, I it's a namesake, I will say, that uh I happen to be an individual who I was uh dedicated as an infant child when I was born to my parents. They had me dedicated, and I was prayed over by Chuck Smith himself, uh, who many might say is the father of the non-denominational movement. So please understand I'm not speaking lightly either about any of this. Um, I do still have tons of family that are probably consider themselves non-denominational, um, and I love and respect them. Um so I get where Dylan's coming from here, and I appreciate it very much.
SPEAKER_01:They were so good to me. They were so sweet. I got discipled super well, and I have met amazing men uh throughout my time in the non-denominational world. And so I do not want to take away from that. Uh, I went on to do ministry for about five years, and I went on to go to seminary at SBTS in the Southern Baptist uh convention, where a lot of these non-denominational churches do lie in these. And so I've been very familiar with this world. I was on staff at a mega church, and now I have attended a megachurch uh for a long time.
SPEAKER_00:I can only imagine the stories that Dylan can tell. Um, and thanks be to God uh that he's still a faithful Christian um and is seeking a deeper faith because I have myself seen and also heard stories that come out of some of the med megachurch scenarios. Um, so thanks be to God that he's still going strong.
SPEAKER_01:And as I've gone through this journey, I have felt uh specific things that I could not uh put to the wayside anymore. And at first it started with looking at the megachurch model overall and saying that this is the problem, like the megachurch is the problem, or some of these uh very popular celebrity pastors are the problem, and they just happen to be under the non-denominational bucket. And so it's just them that I want to critique or that I have I really have a problem with.
SPEAKER_00:I think I hear where Dylan's going here. Um I agree. You know, celebrity pastors are a big part of the problem within the non-denominational megachurch, you know, industry, if you will. It is an industry. Um, but I think I see where Dylan's going here. Let's see.
SPEAKER_01:But as I progressed in my spiritual walk and in maturity, I see this as a non-denominational problem. And I'll go more into that later. In this video, I'm gonna go over 10 points of why I am personally leaving the non-denominational megachurch. Some of them will be more preferences, and some of them I do believe are more biblical and ecclesial in nature. And my last point, the very last point of this video, is going to be my pinnacle, my climax of why I finally made the decision to leave. Let's get started. In my search uh, of is this just a megachurch problem or is this a non-denominational problem? One thing I started to realize is the structure of the church is super important. The structure and the authority of where you get your information, and then also having some type of accountability on top of that structure is the only way to actually have a sustaining model. In the non-denominational world, you have so many different churches that are doing their own things, have their own elder board or pastors that are making decisions on theology. And every single church could technically have a little bit of a different nuance to it. Most of the time, the non-denominational church is pretty conservative and does have good theology.
SPEAKER_00:Do they do they have good theology? I I hear your issue here, Dylan, and and I agree it's true there is a major authority problem within the non-denominational um movement. I would posit, however, my brother, that this problem is not related directly to the non-denominational issue. It's rather, and I'm going to go back to this, it's a Protestant issue. And this is what I'm going to hope that you hear, you know, when you see this. I hope that you hear that these issues you're pointing at are great issues and they're well thought out, and I see where you're coming from, but they're not non-denominational issues. They're not just non-denominational issues. These are Protestant issues, and it really starts, my brother, with sola scriptura. You talked about how each one has their own nuance, right? Each one's different. It's because each one has a pastor or governing body of some sort, some leader of elders, some leader of pastors who have different interpretations than the church across the street, than the church down the road. And so that model is why Protestantism is in the state that it's in. I'll encourage you to consider that non-denominationalism didn't come out from nowhere. There's a history, there's a reason why it exists, and it all comes back to interpretation of holy scripture.
SPEAKER_01:But how long is that going to last? We have seen that the non-denominational church has only been around for 50-ish years, and we have already experienced a roller coaster of what is appropriate and what theology is true doctrine in the church. And there's not really a structure or accountability to keep this thing glued together.
SPEAKER_00:You're absolutely right, Dylan. The problem is that this started right away. I'm sure you're doing your history and you're doing your studying. Look at the Reformation itself. From Martin Luther to Melanchthon to John Calvin to Zwingli, it was a constant shift from, well, yeah, I think you guys aren't going far enough. And well, I think you've gone too far. And these slight variations, as you've already pointed out, leading to these various denominations, even from the inception of the Reformation.
SPEAKER_01:And so even though some of the main lines or the Catholic Church might have things that you disagree with theologically, if you were to make a change, a big C change, and you needed to shift where we are going, the non-denominational world, there's almost no way possible to make a big C shift on theology. But when it comes to the main line or the Catholic Church, they have structures in place to make big C changes. And I believe that that unity and that authority is actually essential to have a sustaining Christian church here in America.
SPEAKER_00:Dylan, I hear you here, but I'm just kind of concerned, you know, this big C change you're talking about. Um I, you know, I'm Eastern Orthodox. There's the classic joke, right? You ask an Orthodox uh, you know, to change a light bulb, and their response is change. Uh, because we pride ourselves in being the deposit of the faith once and for all delivered to the saints. We don't change, it hasn't changed. And so I'm a little concerned that you're looking for that consistency. I think I hear what you're saying, but I think I would put the emphasis on a body that doesn't change as opposed to a body that can change.
SPEAKER_01:Point number two is that the indeed church is getting further and further away from any connection to the actual Protestant Reformation in structure and in purpose. The non-denominational church has nearly come up with a completely new idea of what it means to be the church and what it means to be a Protestant. I don't believe that the non-denominational church should be able to call itself the Protestant church anymore and that it should separate itself, if anything, or just not exist and try to get back into unity with the mainline Protestant church.
SPEAKER_00:Dylan, I hear you, but this, my brother, was exactly the same thing that other reformers were saying about other reformers. The the Calvinists they took it to a point where they thought Luther wasn't clear enough, right? They thought Luther had not had taken maybe too much of a Catholic line, for example, on the Eucharist. They thought it was more, you know, a symbolic, even though they want to say you're ushered up into the presence of Christ. Christ is present somehow, but it's not the same as what Luther was demanding, you know, in that this is it, this is the body of Christ. And then of course you get Zwingli coming along and saying, No, Calvin, they they you know didn't go far enough. It's clearly just and merely a symbol. In other words, they themselves were pointing at each other even back then. And they were saying, Well, you shouldn't be part of the Reformation, right? You you shouldn't be part of uh this movement. And so again, I hear your call and I respect it, and I think you're uh right to have such a dissatisfaction with the non-denominational movement, but I want to point you to the irony of someone who, if you want to stay a Protestant, you're still in the same box, right? You're still in the same boat.
SPEAKER_01:Point number three, true discipleship and accountability. What is the church for? As I've asked myself this question, you come to the conclusion of is it for believers or is it for non-believers?
SPEAKER_00:It's for believers, 100%. Um, but I think you're coming to that conclusion.
SPEAKER_01:If it is for non-believers, you will get the seeker-sensitive model, the mega church model, and they're doing, I guess, pretty well at that. They're they're filling stadiums, they they have plenty of members to go around. But we don't know if they're true followers of Jesus Christ or disciples. I truly believe that the Sunday morning service is for believers and that the church overall is for believers.
SPEAKER_00:And that's thank you, Dylan. That's absolutely true. The church is, it's the body of Christ, right? It is those who have been baptized, who have been sealed, who have the Holy Spirit within them, who are partaking of the body of Christ in the Eucharist, participating in confession, and they are performing the work of the church, the turt, you know, liturgy, right? This is the work of the people in the church. You'll may be impressed to know in Orthodoxy, our liturgy, which we do almost every Sunday, uh with few exceptions, is literally a liturgy that goes back 1700 years. And in this liturgy, it was a regular practice, and we still do it to this day, where the catechumens, those who were not yet fully members of the church, were basically told to go outside, right? To go into the back and wait because what was about to happen, i.e., the Eucharist, was for actual Orthodox Christians, for believers. So I would encourage you to continue along this line. You're absolutely right. Church, certainly, divine liturgy, the liturgy on Sunday, is intended for believers. It is not built as an evangelical device to gain new followers.
SPEAKER_01:That means that fellowship, deep discipleship, church accountability, uh, church discipline, all of those things uh go over the comfort of what a non-believer might feel. I truly believe that the church is for believers. I believe that we do uh invite nonbelievers in, and they are welcome anytime, but the church structure should primarily build up the believers in the body, making sure that they are spiritually healthy, that they are held accountable, they are confessing sin, the practical church disciplines that have taken place all throughout church history. And that is the best way to have a healthy congregation. Point number four is what is the true purpose of a pastor? Something I have noticed in these megachurches or the non-denominational church is that they have changed what it means to truly be a pastor, what they spend their time on, uh, how they shepherd the flock, uh, the terminology that they use, executive pastor or lead pastor, but they don't actually shepherd the people. As I've studied scripture and as I have studied church history and what a shepherd, what a pastor has been throughout the years, it seems as if the megachurch and the non-denominational church has completely made up a position that was never there before.
SPEAKER_00:Amen.
SPEAKER_01:The pastor should be with the people. The pastor should be shepherding and guiding and actually in the muck, in the mud with their people. And if they are extended uh away and they have no access, uh, the the congregation has no access to that pastor. I believe that that's not a true pastor. I believe that is somewhat of a CEO, a business leader, an entrepreneur, uh, an executive suite type of position, but I don't believe that that is a pastor.
SPEAKER_00:There Dylan, I accord with you 100%. I just want to remind you that this didn't come out of a vacuum, right? This there is a progression, there's a reason why the pastor in these megachurch and non-denominational churches are operating as they are. I want to tell you a story quickly, anecdotally, and I hope my sister forgives me for telling this story. My sister attends a church up in Northern California. It's not necessarily a megachurch, but it's definitely, you know, your typical non-denominational um church. You know, they're they're dispensational. They actually have a female pastor. Um, and I think the way they get away with it is she they say she's not the lead pastor. Um, but just to give you some context, and my sister was attending there for over a year, and my sister works in in restaurants, and one day the pastor of the church came into her restaurant um just randomly and was with somebody else, and they sat and talked. And my sister, long story short, she goes up to them at one point and says, Hey, hi, I'm my sister's name. And the pastor's like, Oh, hi, nice to meet you. And my sister goes, Yeah, I've been attending your church for over a year now. And when my sister told me that story, I was so heartbroken because Dylan, that's what you're talking about, right? Here, my sister's been going to that church for over a year, um, and this guy didn't even know who she was. And that's a major, major problem. Um and it needs to be remedied. And I'll tell you right now, in the Orthodox Church, it's not a problem. In the Orthodox Church, the engagement and the the connection to the priests is incredible. Um, and I've never experienced anything like it in the Protestant world, whether it was high church or low church Protestant. So keep that in mind, my brother.
SPEAKER_01:Therefore, I disagree with where the non-denominational church is going when it comes to the pastor role. Point number five, and my last point in this bucket of what the church is truly meant to be, is my rejection of the popular gospel. Something I've seen in indeed churches is trying to really scale back what the gospel is. So talking much about the hope that we have in Jesus, the salvation that we have in Jesus, but really stifling what sin is, what conviction is, what putting uh to death your flesh means, what hell means. I don't know if I've ever heard a sermon in my non-denominational church that talks about hell, talks about truly what your sin does to you and fighting that sin, putting it to death, and that if you are continuing into sin, you might not have salvation. Language like that, that's that's somewhat hard to hear, but we need to hear in that we have progressed into this place where we want to, we want everyone to feel comfortable in this environment. And so we've put our worship into that. We've we've catered our sermons towards that. Everything that we do is is really low uh when it comes to your conviction level. And so as I've progressed in my faith, the popular gospel, I we talk a lot about the prosperity gospel, and we've really put that to shame. But I think something is sprouting up that's the popular gospel, and it's just as dangerous. Uh, I believe that we need to talk about these things. People need to know about their sin, they need to know about hell, even though it's really hard to hear. And I just don't see the non-denominational church doing well at this.
SPEAKER_00:The next I just want to say quickly, I agree with you 100%, and you will not find the popular gospel in the Orthodox Church. Period. End of story.
SPEAKER_01:Next one is more liturgical. What do I think about when you walk in on a Sunday morning? How should that look? How should that feel? And why has my position changed over what the non-denominational church is doing? So, point number one in this bucket is holiness and reverence towards the Lord. There is this growing sentiment in the non-denominational church of that comfort feeling of stripping everything away. Uh, in the holiness of God by R. C. Sprouls, he talks about how the church is slowly stripping away anything that might make someone uncomfortable. And so there's no, there's no uh writings on the walls anymore, there's no stained glass windows that have uh beautiful imagery, there's no incense, there's no candles, there's no nothing.
SPEAKER_00:It's Dylan, this is wild to hear you say this. Um, I I appreciate what you're saying. Everything you just described, you will find in the Orthodox Church. And again, I want to take you back to the fact that the non-denominational Protestant movement did not come out of nowhere. And it starts with, I hate to say this, iconoclasm, right? There is a very real and horrible iconoclasm alive in the American Protestant church today. And it's an iconoclasm that hasn't existed in the church overall. If you look at the history of the church, you're absolutely right. You see the beautiful churches, you see the iconography, you see the beautiful uh reverence for God and the buildings in which the church worshipped from the earliest of times reflected that reverence for God. What I would encourage you to do is to look at the history of the Reformation. In the history of the Reformation, what they were doing, because they were so uh reactionary to Roman Catholicism, what ended up happening is the reformers threw the baby out with the bathwater. It was if it was anything that was looked Catholic, looked, you know, Roman Catholic, it was be it was bad. It's not going to be found in any other branch of the Protestant Church because the Protestant Church has rejected so many things of traditional apostolic ancient Christian practice.
SPEAKER_01:Just a blank box that has absolutely no character and no reverence for the Lord. I don't want it to feel like this hype little country club with uh smoke and lights and laser shows and this rock concert. And you know this when you see it, right? When you go into this old Catholic church or you go into this old uh historical Protestant church and you see this all and it kind of takes your breath away. There is something to that, and I believe that we can accomplish that if we tried.
SPEAKER_00:Now, I don't know what you mean by we can accomplish that if we tried, but you don't have to accomplish it, Dylan. It's been accomplished. It's been in existence for two thousand years. The Orthodox Church has maintained that very Christian practice you talked about. Candles, incense, the reverence for God, the ancient hymns, the ancient liturgy, the priests' investments, the the Eucharist. Why? Because this is how God has chosen to be worshipped. It goes back to the Old Testament, as you know. The more you study history, you're gonna see this. God commanded his people to worship him with a ton of reference. If you when you go back and look at the Old Testament temple, right? And then you see Christianity coming right out of the Jewish synagogue practice, the temple practice, where it was this very reverent and very sim a symbolic and ceremonial practice, including the incense, including the images that you see in that Jewish practice. The Christian practice uh grew out of that naturally. And that's why it's always been part of the practice of the Christian church. And that includes includes something as simple as the simple sign of the cross, showing others and reminding yourself that you are a Christian and that the cross defines who you are. These are the things that you're lacking if you're a Protestant, not just if you're non-denominational, but if just being Protestant, you're missing out on this.
SPEAKER_01:But the non-denominational church is tending in the wrong direction towards the holiness and reverence of God. It's more pointing towards people, it's more spotlight towards people rather than spotlight towards God. And I can't take it anymore. And my next point is I want more complexity in the liturgy. Yes, simple in nature, as in it's not uh kind of this big production.
SPEAKER_00:I know that Cloud of Witnesses' audience right now is probably saying to themselves, because I know I am. It's like Dylan, you just want to shake you and just go, Dylan, come to a divine liturgy, come to an Orthodox church near you today. You will find what you're looking for.
SPEAKER_01:But when it comes to historical Protestantism, we've always had things like creeds, things like traditional hymns, things like uh confessional prayers as a congregation, things that actually add some depth and some reverence into your natural rhythms uh as a congregation. Rather than I could tell you what every single non-denominational church does, we have announcements, we have three songs, we have the sermon, and then we have another song at the end. Maybe in there, we have about two minutes of prayer. Uh, every once in a while, we might add one little thing uh to to shake it up a little bit. But other than that, that is what we go through. I don't think ever in my non-denominational church have we ever read a creed, uh, have we ever went uh through any type of confessional prayer or benediction, uh, a confessional prayer, uh, nothing like that.
SPEAKER_00:And I no, you're not gonna see that in the non-denominational world because they have no reverence or really any thought to history whatsoever, right? What matters in a non-denominational church? Well, what matters is growing the church, right? More people, the evangelical spirit, which look, with well-intentioned Christians, I get it. It's a and it's a beautiful thing to want to share their faith and to grow the church, of course. But in that, like you said, it's so seeker sensitive and it's so focused on growth that you lose the focus on Christ. And that's what I want to get back to. In Orthodoxy and at the time of the Reformation, another problem of the Reformation, Dylan, is this movement of where you see the pastor, right? You talked about this performative, it kind of puts the people as the most important thing instead of God, instead of Christ Himself. Well, at the Reformation, as you likely know, uh, it was the Protestants who the altar was always the center, right? The center of the faith. And when you would come in, the f right in the middle of the church, right there at the where everyone is is pointed is the altar, right? Is the presence of Christ. Well, for various reasons and for various denominations, that either got taken away completely or it got moved off to the side. And what replaced it? The podium, the lectern, the place where the pastor would give his sermon. And so suddenly, even physically, even where the focal point in a Protestant circle, and you're gonna get this in every Protestant denomination, they've moved the lectern, the pulpit to the center. So that becomes the most important thing, not Christ. Only within Orthodoxy and to some extent within the Roman Catholic Church, you still get a focus on the body of Christ, the worship of Christ. It is the center, it is the focal point, it's the entire reason we're there, not some charismatic speaker, so we can get, like you said, some pep rally, you know, that's gonna hype us up for the next day.
SPEAKER_01:I want something like that. And I guess another way to say it is I want to feel a part of the experience. Uh sometimes in the non-denominational church, you could just go in and consume, and everything is spoon-fed to you, and you don't have to really do much. You could sit in the back, you could go through the motions, you don't have to sing, you listen to the sermon, and you could just walk out. In the traditional liturgy, you're actually participating with your fellow believers around you, and it feels like you're you're a part of something bigger. And I like that.
SPEAKER_00:Nope. Amen. I'm gonna say one word liturgea, right? It's the Greek word for liturgy. It's it means work. It's the work of the people. I mentioned this earlier. Come to an Orthodox divine liturgy, you will see the things that you're looking for. Does not sit in the back. You know, now can any Christian do that on some level? Can you be checked out of your faith? Sure. Absolutely. And is that a problem for all Christians? Absolutely, right? We're warned about it time and time again throughout the New Testament, including in Hebrews, not to fall away. However, it is very difficult to do in the Orthodox Church because the very act of being in the divine liturgy, you're part of the service. In fact, it's a well-known uh kind of factoid in Orthodoxy. If there's not at least one parishioner there, the priest cannot give a divine liturgy because it's not a performative thing. It's not a some sort of magical, you know, event that is performed by a priest. It is part of the body of Christ. It's with the people. And so, unless unless there's at least one person there, the divine liturgy cannot take place.
SPEAKER_01:I'm going to go through some personal reasons. These are going to be rapid fire because it's not really biblical. It's just my personal preference. One, it's super feminine. Uh, the non-denominational church, if you walk into the sanctuary, if you're a man, you do not feel welcome there. You feel as if you're going to a tea party uh with your wife and some gals, and I can't stand it. And that comes in the aesthetic and that comes in the design. Two, fellowship. Unless you actually go so far out of your way to get involved and to get into a good community and really fight for those friendships, the fellowship is extremely surface level and it's really hard to get past that, even for those who are the most involved. It's really easy in a sea of people to get completely lost and to do your own thing and not really live life on life with people, having true conversations, confessing your sin. And it's just, you just go through the motions. Three, the worship sets. Uh, we have put so much priority on these songs that are, again, feminine, they focus on emotion and they're not really that reverent. I don't need a pep rally every single Sunday morning. And I just want to be able to honor God with my lips and sing, and even more so congregationally. I love to hear the voice of the other believers around me. And when it's this big smoke show and light show, and it's like this explosion of music, it's really hard to focus. Uh, it seems like your dopamine senses are just going wild. And I can't hear any of the people around me. I can just hear the people on stage, and it's all about emotions most of the time.
SPEAKER_00:Dylan, you're absolutely accurate. You I agree 100%. It's another reason why I myself am not a non-denominational Christian anymore. I am no longer a Protestant whatsoever. You're looking for the priesthood, you're looking for deacons, you're looking for bishops, you're looking for true leadership in the church. Not to mention, of course, the beautiful work of all of the ladies in the church, including very importantly, um, oftentimes in the choirs, singing and providing so many beautiful elements that makes the liturgy as beautiful as it is. It is completely and totally reliant on men and women. However, if you're looking for that faith that is not so feminine focused and you're not going to feel uncomfortable like you're at a cold plague concert, come find an Orthodox church near you today.
SPEAKER_01:Or community groups. I don't think we want to talk about it, but community groups are not that effective, mainly because the people who are leading them are not actually built up to be pastors and to lead people in this way. They're most of the time random couples that have been in the church for five years and have never studied scripture, have never led people. But we need those leaders to step up. And so we just throw them in a group and leading 10 people. And then all of a sudden, it's the blind leading the blind.
SPEAKER_00:That has been, I hate to say it, it is the model within the non-denominational movement. You have the blind leading the blind. It's a fact to this day. A lot of non-denominational pastors, I would think the majority of them never went to seminary. Seminary is not important to them. What matters in the non-denominational movement is are you charismatic? Do people want to come hear you talk? And if so, come on down. You know, Pastor Bob has given his his, you know, end times prophecies uh watch speech on Sunday night. Everyone gets fired up. Does Pastor Bob have any idea what he's talking about?
SPEAKER_01:And so community groups are ineffective. And I think as a primary way to do fellowship and to build up the body, I don't think it's a great idea. Those are more of my personal preferences. Take those as you will. But my number one, the pinnacle, the climax of why I am leaving the ND church over everything else is communion. Communion and baptism, really. But the traditional Protestant view of the sacraments, uh specifically communion over everything.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, how long, you guys? You guys want to put in put in bets? How long until Dylan's going to become Orthodox? Man, oh man, Dylan, you're so close, my brother. What you're looking for, what your heart is desiring, where the spirit is leading you, is so close. It's right down the street from you. Find an Orthodox church. Go talk to a priest, bring up everything that you brought up in this video, and you will have answers that will might shock you with to how fulfilling they are and how much history and depth and richness and reverence is there. It's all here. Why? Because Christ established a visible church on earth, Dylan. He established it himself 2,000 years ago. And that church has existed by the laying on of hands from one bishop and priest and deacon to the next for 2,000 years. I happen to attend an Antiochian Orthodox church. It's all the same. Greek Orthodox, Russian, it doesn't matter. It's the Orthodox Church. But my point is that we go back to Antioch. Antioch, if you read in the New Testament, is where Christians were first called Christians. The Apostle Paul, the Apostle Peter. They were there in Antioch. And that's the faith that I practice to this day. So what you're looking for, Dylan, is not found in some church founded 500 years ago. I'm sorry, it's not. The depth you're looking for is not there in Protestantism. Come. Come and see.
SPEAKER_01:Baptism is right there behind. The non-denominational church does not take these near as serious as I think we should in how the historical Protestant church took them. The communion, uh, the Lord's table as a congregation used to be the pinnacle of each service. Not the sermon, not the TED talk, not the pastor being charismatic and funny and giving this awesome sermon. It was always the Lord's supper. And I believe there is something special and supernatural that happens in communion. I do not believe that it's just the remembrance or it's just a symbol. I am still figuring out how I truly feel. The Catholic Church and the historical Protestant Church, even the Eastern Orthodox Church, they all try to explain it in different ways. But in the in the root of it, it is essentially there's something special that happens in communion. And I truly believe that. Right now I lean more towards a real presence view, but I know that there is something special that happens in communion. In the way that the ND church goes about these sacraments, I just I just don't feel the same way.
SPEAKER_00:Again, John chapter six, Christ says, if you do not eat my flesh and drink my blood, there is no life in you, right? For this is my body and this is my blood. It is true food. My brother, you are absolutely right. Come find what you're looking for. The wait does not need to be long. It's right here. It's been practiced for 2,000 years.
SPEAKER_01:And this is not a decision that I made quickly. This was a lot of prayer, a lot of conversations with my wife. Uh, all of our best friends are in the non-denominational churches. We're gonna have to completely start over from scratch. And that is not something that we just made on a whim. Also, I'm very firm on not leaving your church just because you don't like it or just because of your preferences. I believe that if you're tied into a community and you are a membership of a church, that should be taken very seriously. With that said, I have talked to my pastors in depth about some of the things that I'm feeling, and they do not feel the same way. We are going a different direction, theologically, philosophically, liturgically, in every way. They are going one direction and I am going a different direction. And so it was a decision that I felt like I needed to make because in my heart, when I walked in on a Sunday morning, it was not in a good place and I couldn't get it there because I did not agree with where we were going. As for where I go now, I honestly don't know. To be honest, I was fully dedicated to my church. I wanted to be fully engaged, present, and talking to my pastors about all these things before ever thinking about where I was going next. And so I wasn't looking at other denominations, I wasn't looking uh at other uh churches in the local area. I was fully dedicated to my church. But as I've said, I'm not going to any non-denominational churches and I am not going to the SBC anymore. I will be focused more on the mainline churches. And here on this channel, I want to document where that takes me and which ones that I am leaning more towards. If I had to guess, it's probably going to be Presbyterian, but who knows?
SPEAKER_00:If you are Dylan, let me literally from one Christian man to another, let me save you some time and heartache, my brother, because the journey you're talking about, I literally went on that journey. I went from a non-denominational Christian to learning a lot more about my faith and getting very serious about my faith and learning about theology and reading church history. And I ended up becoming a reformed Presbyterian Christian myself. I was five-point Calvinist, I was Orthodox Presbyterian, and it meant everything because coming from a non-denominational background, the Calvinist, the Presbyterian, the Reformed position looks fantastic. Looks like they got it all figured out. They've got their theology, they have their systematic theologies, their confessions you were talking about, right? It sounds like they're the ones that got it together, right? They're a bit more high church, so you get that reverence. They've got the older hymns, right? And so it seems like it's a great place to go. Let me tell you, it is not the answer you're looking for, Dylan. I have heard your other videos. I follow your content. I know you want unity, right? You want to bring the Protestant church back together. You want the church to come back together into unity. You even said in this video, maybe the non-denominational movement should just go away, right? Dylan, you still have the same problem. Let's say you go become Presbyterian. Well, your Lutheran brothers are going to still be disagreeing with you on major, major issues, including the Lord's Supper, including communion, as you mentioned, which is so important. Your Anglicans are going to be disagreeing with you. Your Baptists, your Reformed Baptists are going to be disagreeing with you, let alone your Methodists and your Pentecostals and all of these other groups. Are they all going to become Presbyterian? Is that the answer? Does the whole world need to become Presbyterian? Did the church get it wrong for 1500, 1600 years before the Presbyterians got their act together and then, oh, this is how it should have been all along? Is that really the view that you want to take? So I would encourage you. Instead of taking a pit stop at the Presbyterian Church, where you're going to get a lot of let's face it, there's a lot of problems in the Presbyterian Church. The Presbyterian Church USA, right, mired in the woke liberal politics. Why? How? How does that happen? How has it happened? The Orthodox Church to this day, for 2,000 years, Dylan, and we do not have that issue of woke this or female priest. You don't see it. It doesn't exist. Why? Because the structure of the church that was created by Christ through his apostles and thereby after through the bishops, the overseers of the church, through the power of the Holy Spirit, Christ and the Holy Spirit have preserved his church. And they didn't make mistakes when they did it. And so to consider the Presbyterian model, just to give you one clear example, the the creed that you would recite in a Presbyterian church contains the Filioque. The Filioque was a Roman Catholic innovation. The Roman Catholics modified, they unilaterally modified the ecumenical creed. Scripture says clearly the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father. End of sentence, that's it. The Roman Catholics, late, late, late, added a phrase to that, which is not in Scripture. And so Protestants, including Presbyterians, recite a creed that's been changed by the Roman Catholics, and you don't even agree with the Roman Catholics. I'm pointing that out to give you even just one small example of how the ancient practice of the faith has been changed, has been, has been modified in the Presbyterian Church. It's not the the final answer. You mentioned you believe in in you think you're leaning towards the real presence of Christ in in the Eucharist. The Presbyterians are not going to get you all the way there. The Lutherans have a much stronger view on the presence of Christ, right? They believe it's the actual body and blood of Christ. Now they have maybe, you could argue, it's kind of a strange doctrine to get you there. But they don't have a a lighter view, which the the Presbyterians tend to do. They do not believe you're it's you're partaking of the actual body and blood of Christ. Which again I encourage you, read John chapter 6. Read it. With what you're studying, Dylan, I respect and I hope and pray that you and your family um would just you know mindfully and prayerfully consider what you're doing because it sounds like you're coming to all the right conclusions. You really are. And they're conclusions that I came to myself. And so, my brother, I'll put the call out there again. If you ever want to speak about this, if you ever want to get together, better yet, I would love to have you come on Cloud of Witnesses. I'd be happy to talk with you on your podcast. Let's discuss the differences between the Protestant movement and the East and Orthodoxy as preserved for 2,000 years. Uh my reactions and commentary here on your video. Anyone watching this right now, please keep Dylan and his family in your prayers. Go give him a follow, give him a like. Um this kind of content, I believe, is is what's changing the face of Christianity, is people are coming to see how Protestantism has spun out so far now that people are literally waking up going, what's going on? Is this Christianity with the smoke machines and the drums and the you know, all the craziness? And they're coming to find that there actually is the right practice of the Christian church, of the Christian faith. And it's been here all along, thanks be to God.