Many thanks to everyone who took the time to put fingers to keyboard! The fact that you took time out to think about and answer my questions was very touching and the answers encouraging. Sorry it’s taken so long to reply but I do not have access to the internet much.
Our experience after going it alone for one year in Africa was crash landing in the West with almost nothing. It took two months for any kind of Govt. benefits to kick in but during that time we were first adopted by a sweet Christian family and then by the landlord of a house we rented (no deposit, first month rent free). This was in a small village, with a great sense of community. We became the dumping ground for anything that was spare in the village, which was great as everything we needed landed on our doorstep. All this from the very beginning without asking anyone anything, a far cry from the push & shove of provisioning in the F and squabbling over videoing areas. It was very much, ‘stand back & see me fight’. Great to see The Lords love & mercy expressed in this way!
Financially we are OK on a day-to-day basis but unable to move ahead and make our money work for us. I.e. invest in a property other than paying rent.
We tried many churches and found that most of what the F believes & prides itself on is practiced by many Christians, loving Jesus (without the sex), prophecy, witnessing, strong sense of community, etc. So much for being elite. This was very interesting to see but also a bit of a put off as it reminded us of the F so much. There seems to be two camps, the warm fuzzy, strong on following the HS kind and the rigid, cold, strong on scripture kind. We’ve not found anyone with a balance yet.
There’s also the thing of whatever someone is into or in awe off, be it prophecy, healing, witnessing or whatever its kind of like, ‘OK, been there, done that’. Once you’ve committed and sacrificed your life in the way that you do in the F nothing seems to impress, even if it was for a wrong cause. What do you call that? Burnt out, cynical, disillusioned?
As far as Church service is concerned can’t stand, stand up, sing a song, sit down, stand up, sing a song, sit down and then listen to someone telling you what to do with your life. I think it should be in smaller groups as a social occasion where you sit and discuss the Bible, faith, make sense out of experiences, etc.
Gods will is a biggee as while in the F I always felt I knew exactly what His will was not just generally but for that day. Now, I just know what it isn’t. I suppose I’ve not learnt to hear or trust Him yet. But how can I if I doubt His word (my original Greek/Hebrew question), have found many of the same negative traits in the Churches as in the F, wishful thinking and fantasies being interpreted as prophecy, autocracy and an awful lot of worldly & materialistic attitudes accepted as norm. I’ve accepted spiritual paralysis and the only way I can see an answer to this is for God to have mercy and speak to me so clearly. I can’t accept it’s supposed to be shrouded in mystery. God has to be smart enough to communicate to us the answers in a way that makes sense.
In the mean time, we try our best to care for our kids and live a life. We have Christian friends although I think they think we’re quite unusual sometimes as we often question the norm and have a different perspective on things. For example when something comes up someone will say, ‘As Christians we’re supposed to….’ We often say, ‘Says who?’ And often people realise that there is no scriptural reason for their practices or ideas.
OK doubt time.
There’s something I don’t understand about one of the fundamentals of Christianity. Why did God require in the OT a sacrifice of an animal and then in the NT His Son?
If its grace & forgiveness that grants us reconciliation and salvation why does it need to be symbolised this way? Does it not get in the way of the real meaning especially in the OT? Couldn’t a profit have given a message and said, ‘It’s by grace folks, not by works’?
One more thing; The Jews are supposed to be His chosen people. How can an impartial God choose and favour one ethnic group above all his other creations who were created in His image equally? Paul said before Jesus salvation was of the Jews. Couldn’t the Gentiles of the OT argue that they were not given a fair chance?
By the way, Acheick how do you pronounce your name? Know what you mean about the studies, however while enjoying and understanding the concepts finding it difficult to memorise the details as it is distance learning. May quite and take it up latter as its 12 hours per week of my free time and we hit the ground running when we left the F and have been running ever since. I feel like I need a six-month break from everything as the spiritual issues were put on the back burner until now so we could get the physical sorted out.
Anyway, tx again everyone for your comments!
Fred