What is the difference between congregations affiliated with the North American Christian Convention (NACC -- a division of the Restoration Movement) and the various conservative Baptist denominations, (such as the Southern Baptist denomination)

Churches are businesses. They’re specifically a special type of business that doesn’t have to pay taxes, but whatever.

Like any business that gets big enough, it will break off and start franchises. Most churches you see on the road are franchises. The church I attended was a “franchise” of the United Pentecostal Church, International. My pastor paid dues to be a member of that organization. Our Sunday School lessons were purchased from the UPCI publishing company. Our church bylaws, dress code, etc. was set by the UPCI.

I’m not at all familiar with the NACC, but Wikipedia suggests it’s an actual convention, rather than a denomination. Churches do donate to the convention, so that might suggest membership, and independent churches with no official affiliation might use their support of the NACC to anchor their church to something. That is simply speculation on my part.

Thanks for answering, and for interest in answering me. But your answer (Seek) was not very helpful. You even say you are unfamiliar with the group in question, and furthermore, accuse churches as being businesses that “do not pay taxes’

Well, they sure pay their dues in services. They’re certainly non-profit and have very low salaries for the work involved.
It seems that another answerer’s response was removed by the moderator.

What’s with you guys? This is a valid question and not a cause for insulting or bashing. That’s why I designated in the “General and not the Social section.

I do not ascribe to the groups I asked about. I AM a Christian in a mainline protestant denomination. Please answer the question if you are familiar with these groups.

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They are businesses. Legally and in fact.

When a church is started it files as a commercial enterprise with the local government.

The affiliations of the corner chapel with worldwide enterprises such as the United Methodist Church are real business affiliations.

You can quibble about what skirt length they allow on the pulpit and whether they allow electric guitars, but these are by-laws. They are a side effect of the business relationship, not the meat of it.

There are something like 30,000 different denominations currently active in the United States. You would be hard-pressed to find anyone who is familiar with all of them.

If you’re looking for specific information on one specific denomination, it’s probably best to ask them directly.

I think its legit to ask about a specific denomination and not expect that person to know 30,000 of them. My question was specific to the ones named in the question.

If I ask about comparing SAMS to COSTCO, I am not disputing whether or not they are businesses. Nowhere in my question did I dispute the organizations involved (denominations) were businesses.
They certainly ARE non-profit organizations, however, In fact, the one you mentioned, the United Methodist Church, does the overwhelming majority of charitable health care in my city—more than other service organizations or the government agencies.

So I will rephrase the question. How do businesses that ascribe to the NACC differ from those which ascribe to the various Baptist conventions? If my question about Christian organizations is offensive, don’t bother answering

I don’t know how accurate Wikipedia is in every detail, but I decided to take a quick look see.

Apparently when the Church of Christ and the Disciples of Christ finally split it was the more conservative leaning ones who created the NACC back in 1027. So, in that regard I’d expect them to be quite similar to the SBC in most matters of doctrine and attitude toward contemporary issues like abortion and homosexuality.

I guess the two biggest aspects of dissimilarity would be the fact that they dislike being called or acting like a denomination (which, in essence, they are) and they believe that baptism by immersion is essential to salvation.

I’ve known a fair number of Baptists of varying stripes in my time and have yet to find any Baptists who would go quite that far. So thats a viewpoint pretty much unique to the Churches of Christ. How much that topic actually arises in everyday matters, I have no idea but it is pretty distinctive to them.

So, if one is a very conservative or fundy type Christian, I’m assuming they’d be pretty comfortable at a NACC convention.

If one is a more progressive type of Christian, eh, not so much. Personally, I won’t be buying my ticket and arranging transportation to this event. Since I’ve abandoned belief in the literal unending torture of hell fire myth, I’ve got quite enough people willing to call me a heretic. I really don’t need to look around to find another bunch to add in :)