Just found God

[TheTechnician]

I am new to faith. I do not profess to be of one denomination or another, infact I have not even decided on a fellowship at this point. I have made some poor choices in life as I am sure we all have. I also have had some trying times over the last few years. Finally after many struggles I started praying, reading and putting my faith in God. My life has changed for the better since I embraced faith but I am still having a hard time with many of the "Christian" values. I was not raised in the church and my folks have always been all inclusive, gay, straight, black, white and what have you. I am very much in the live and let live category. I mean, truly, my role is not to judge others or their actions, that is God's job. What are your thoughts on this? Is this common among progressive Christians? My sister is a Born Again and sometimes I feel like her husband uses his faith as a license to hate anyone different from them. How can I find a fellowship that doesn't subscribe to hate mongering?

[JosephM]

Hello Technician and welcome to the forum.

I think you are on the right track putting aside personal judgement. It goes along way toward keeping ourselves guilt free as when we judge another we are  in reality judging ourselves. Progressive Christianity is an inclusive religion without traditional dogma and doctrine of the church system. It's a journey and i think you might find a lot of interesting posts from members concerning it Here - >>>>>> 

Joseph

[PaulS]

19 hours ago, TheTechnician said:

I am new to faith. I do not profess to be of one denomination or another, infact I have not even decided on a fellowship at this point. I have made some poor choices in life as I am sure we all have. I also have had some trying times over the last few years. Finally after many struggles I started praying, reading and putting my faith in God. My life has changed for the better since I embraced faith but I am still having a hard time with many of the "Christian" values. I was not raised in the church and my folks have always been all inclusive, gay, straight, black, white and what have you. I am very much in the live and let live category. I mean, truly, my role is not to judge others or their actions, that is God's job. What are your thoughts on this? Is this common among progressive Christians? My sister is a Born Again and sometimes I feel like her husband uses his faith as a license to hate anyone different from them. How can I find a fellowship that doesn't subscribe to hate mongering?

Welcome to the forum TT,

I hope you enjoy delving into and participating here.

Personally, I wouldn't get too hung up on 'Christian' values.  Too many churches and people have all manner of rules that don't contribute to love and wholeness but are rather about exclusivity and divisiveness.  Live and let live sounds like a terrific philosophy/belief system to me.  I find Progressive Christianity to be so much more accepting and relaxed about God than those who are 'certain' about God wants.  My experience has been those that are most certain about God and Jesus are often the least reflective of what I understand a Christian to be.

If you are looking for a fellowship that doesn't subscribe to hate mongering perhaps Google Progressive Christianity in your area, or maybe utilize the ProgressiveChristianity.org main site which shares details of PC churches and groups under its tab 'Community'.

Cheers

Paul

[thormas]

Welcome Technician ............

[Elen1107]

On 2/27/2020 at 10:20 AM, TheTechnician said:

 I mean, truly, my role is not to judge others or their actions, that is God's job. What are your thoughts on this? 

Hi, Welcome to the group. I'm not a new member, but I haven't posted in this forum for like five years, until like 2-3 days ago. Hope you can find some exchanges that are worthwhile to you.

Concerning your quote and question: I don't think we can throw out our "judgement" completely with regards to people or other people. I've rather recently met two people who turned out to be child abusers,... one of them in church. Both were rather, and very much unrepentant and both had their children taken away from them.

It really wasn't much a matter of "judgement" on my part, I just couldn't handle it, and I am no longer their friends. However I have been wondering if some kind of 'judgement' or something might be in order here. I don't think we can throw out our 'good judgement' when it comes to somethings or somepeople's attitudes and or actions.

Sorry for making my welcoming post to you with such negative subject matter included, but your question brought this to mind, and it has been on my mind a good deal recently.

Hope things go well for you, and Welcome again.

[thormas]

10 minutes ago, Elen1107 said:

Concerning your quote and question: I don't think we can throw out our "judgement" completely with regards to people or other people. I've rather recently met two people who turned out to be child abusers,... one of them in church. Both were rather, and very much unrepentant and both had their children taken away from them.

I think this is a great insight: sometimes such judgement is essential in the case of not only child abuse as you have shown but, for example, with bullying. We might not know why one abuses a child or why one is a bully - but we can definitely say, "No!" such actions are wrong.

[Elen1107]

9 minutes ago, thormas said:

I think this is a great insight: sometimes such judgement is essential in the case of not only child abuse as you have shown but, for example, with bullying. We might not know why one abuses a child or why one is a bully - but we can definitely say, "No!" such actions are wrong.

I agree with you. Bullying can be some pretty sick and awful stuff. One needs to say No! and have no tolerance.

Figuring out why they are that way and if one or someone can help them comes afterwards,... that's if one can handle dealing with it at all.

Concerning the New Testament on this subject all that comes to mind for me right now is that "a husband must have the proper understanding if his wife is not the same size or stature" . . . and "never be harsh with her", (the first quote is from 1st Peter, 3-7 and the second is from Colossians 3, 19).

I'm thinking that this should pertain to all people and that size and stature DOES matter, no matter what the gender, age, ethnicity or what-ever and other differences people might have. 

Myself I don't like organized fighting or wrestling, (and probably wouldn't have much to say about it if it was illegalize or something). But at least there people are categorized in terms of weight and training and ability, and it's a person's choice as to whether they agree to a physical fight.

I'm thinking that there have got to be other quotes from the bible pertaining to this, but none of them comes to mind right now. There is "Turn the other cheek", … but what does one do if someone then does slam a person multiple times in "the other cheek"?  . . < If you have an answer to that one, Please let me know . . . . 

 

[thormas]

39 minutes ago, Elen1107 said:

I'm thinking that this should pertain to all people and that size and stature DOES matter, no matter what the gender, age, ethnicity or what-ever and other differences people might have. 

I agree and I like this idea. It is simply respect for the other as a person, as a human being, as a Child of God/Spirit.

[Elen1107]

I didn't mean to start a totally new topic on  The Technician's welcoming post-thread.

I got the capital 'T's mixed up and thought I was writing to The Technician instead of Thormas, and that The Technician was opening up his welcoming post-thread to this/these ideas.

Sorry about that.

[TheTechnician]

On 3/2/2020 at 4:01 AM, Elen1107 said:

Hi, Welcome to the group. I'm not a new member, but I haven't posted in this forum for like five years, until like 2-3 days ago. Hope you can find some exchanges that are worthwhile to you.

Concerning your quote and question: I don't think we can throw out our "judgement" completely with regards to people or other people. I've rather recently met two people who turned out to be child abusers,... one of them in church. Both were rather, and very much unrepentant and both had their children taken away from them.

It really wasn't much a matter of "judgement" on my part, I just couldn't handle it, and I am no longer their friends. However I have been wondering if some kind of 'judgement' or something might be in order here. I don't think we can throw out our 'good judgement' when it comes to somethings or somepeople's attitudes and or actions.

Sorry for making my welcoming post to you with such negative subject matter included, but your question brought this to mind, and it has been on my mind a good deal recently.

Hope things go well for you, and Welcome again.

I am glad of any dialog you are willing to share. Maybe I am using the word "judge" as a metaphor for, I guess, live and let live.

If someone is doing wrong, it is not judging them by you doing the right thing and affecting some kind of change in their behavior. Even if it is reporting them to the authorities, you are making a positive change in their lives. Humans are bad at asking for help and resisting temptation, in whatever form it is. I know this from experience. I have battled with addiction for a very long time. Having faith has made a big difference in fighting that battle.

It is a real bummer that folks like those in your tale hide behind faith while acting counter to it. It makes it hard to want to explore fellowship without being hesitant or untrusting. I am completely new to this as I previously stated. No previous religious experience at all, so you can imagine how hard it is when all you hear are the horror stories surrounding faith, religion, the Bible, Christianity, Catholicism, Muslim and so on. Finding God is no picnic in this day and age. 

 

I attended my first voluntary Church service last Sunday. I felt welcomed and loved and it was a great experience. It was a Unitarian Church and again, I sang and prayed but I felt the message was lacking something for me. Maybe it's because I am reading the KJV from cover to cover right now and I need a bit more theology in the sermon?

Thanks for the chat. Respond if you like.

[Elen1107]

5 minutes ago, TheTechnician said:

I am glad of any dialog you are willing to share. Maybe I am using the word "judge" as a metaphor for, I guess, live and let live.

I find it difficult to find the right words concerning the subject of "judgment" myself. Like you say, sometimes it can be the right thing and sometimes it can be the wrong thing to be doing, and very much so, considering different circumstances.

5 minutes ago, TheTechnician said:

If someone is doing wrong, it is not judging them by you doing the right thing and affecting some kind of change in their behavior. Even if it is reporting them to the authorities, you are making a positive change in their lives. Humans are bad at asking for help and resisting temptation, in whatever form it is. I know this from experience. I have battled with addiction for a very long time. Having faith has made a big difference in fighting that battle.

Good for you in your being able to face and step up to your "battle with addiction". I'm sure you will find that you have "climbed a mountain" or two at a certain point in this great and brave endeavor. 

Maybe I shouldn't be saying this, but I sometimes feel like one can get "high on God" or on faith, and that this can sometimes fill in where other things, like substances, leave off and can also be very harmful.

Good Luck to you, and forever on this!

5 minutes ago, TheTechnician said:

It is a real bummer that folks like those in your tale hide behind faith while acting counter to it. It makes it hard to want to explore fellowship without being hesitant or untrusting. I am completely new to this as I previously stated. No previous religious experience at all, so you can imagine how hard it is when all you hear are the horror stories surrounding faith, religion, the Bible, Christianity, Catholicism, Muslim and so on. Finding God is no picnic in this day and age.

I agree and sympathize with you completely. Myself, I have ended up doing my spirituality very much on my own and independently. It isn't easy, but it can be done, and I myself am ok with it, though at some point I might be looking for more face to face contact with people concerning this.

5 minutes ago, TheTechnician said:

I attended my first voluntary Church service last Sunday. I felt welcomed and loved and it was a great experience. It was a Unitarian Church and again, I sang and prayed but I felt the message was lacking something for me. Maybe it's because I am reading the KJV from cover to cover right now and I need a bit more theology in the sermon?

Thanks for the chat. Respond if you like.

I have attended a number of Unitarian churches myself. They vary a lot even within the same state or general area. I'd finally found one that I really liked, when I had to move, and now can no longer go there. My sister has done Unitarianism for like decades, and says she really loves it.

You say that you are reading the KJV from cover to cover. You might find that many Progressive Christians tend to be rather unfundamentalistic with regards to the bible. That is that they don't always find the bible to be "the whole word of God and nothing but the word of God", which is not to say that they don't find some of what, or even a good deal of what, they would call "the word of God" or "truth" in the bible. There are many books and scholarly debates on this subject as well as just as many regular folks talking about and debating it. 

If you find a bible verse or two that stump you, or even that you flat out disagree with, you are likely to find a sympathetic ear and even some agreement among Progressive Christians, and possibly even find a few of them in this PC forum.

Good Luck with all you are trying to achieve and all the mountains you are trying to climb!

Welcome Again!

[Burl]

2 hours ago, TheTechnician said:

I am glad of any dialog you are willing to share. Maybe I am using the word "judge" as a metaphor for, I guess, live and let live.

If someone is doing wrong, it is not judging them by you doing the right thing and affecting some kind of change in their behavior. Even if it is reporting them to the authorities, you are making a positive change in their lives. Humans are bad at asking for help and resisting temptation, in whatever form it is. I know this from experience. I have battled with addiction for a very long time. Having faith has made a big difference in fighting that battle.

It is a real bummer that folks like those in your tale hide behind faith while acting counter to it. It makes it hard to want to explore fellowship without being hesitant or untrusting. I am completely new to this as I previously stated. No previous religious experience at all, so you can imagine how hard it is when all you hear are the horror stories surrounding faith, religion, the Bible, Christianity, Catholicism, Muslim and so on. Finding God is no picnic in this day and age. 

 

I attended my first voluntary Church service last Sunday. I felt welcomed and loved and it was a great experience. It was a Unitarian Church and again, I sang and prayed but I felt the message was lacking something for me. Maybe it's because I am reading the KJV from cover to cover right now and I need a bit more theology in the sermon?

Thanks for the chat. Respond if you like

Find a book on how to read the bible.  Cover to cover is not a good strategy.  You will read over a lot of important connections that way, and most die in the dusty desert of Deuteronomy.