christians and fundamentalism

In relation to the limited paramaters that Christianity and other monotheistic religions set out, I refer to God as he. In relation to the general concept, I refer to god as it. Afterall, how can a perfect being be constrained by gender as limited by our own perceptions....

 

I'm in shock.

 

christinaity isnt bbeconin less and less thousands of ppl are turnin to christ all across the world......the reasom bein is that there is a spiritual revival......there is also a spiriatual war....the good and the bad!as the world gets closer to the end,things will get stronger more things will hpn!

but enough about that u asked how i became a christian!
YES i was obught up with sorta christina parents,liek u it wasnt a major role in my life untill after my mum went in2 hos[pital and a lady who went to this church helped look after her wen she got out....i went to this church with her and her daughters who iv known practicly all my life know.......but it still dint really hav that much effect on me,ubtil i grew up and i strted havin alot of difficulties with past experiences in my familly(i wont go in2 detail about it,but i hada rough childhood) it was these things that made me very angry and withdrawn from ppl,and from the thought that god wud ever b interested in little ol me!

i started gettin depressed from the age of 14 and the doctors put me on pills to help me........they gave me mood swings and i was a bit scary!i tried alot of things to amke me hp,mostly relationships,coz all i really wanted was love.
but i never found it.......untill one night i took it out on god! i sed sumfin like ive been goin to church for most of my life,and uve never been there,u say ure a god of love!WOT LOVE! why do all these bad things happen to me,wot did i ever do!..............was very angry and i was baout to do something very stupid!........then i said if ure this amazing god who every1 says he is then show urelelf now.
strange thing was....i wasnt expecting it.....i dint see him or anything,but i felt somoething different,something strange,i didnt move,i cudnt move......i was cryin my eyes out but i didnt know why.i just knew that something felt different,something spiritual,warm......and i said,if that was you god,then il give u a try..........................and 5 years l8r this is the result!

i found an awesom church! really lively,they helped me overcome all the crap that i had2 tog through as a kid,and most off all i learnt to rely on god,not ppl or how i feel!and i wud say that im solid now!i stand on god and he is awesome!every1s testemony id different!
coz every1 goes thorugh differant paths in life!
but the cool thing is a variety of ppl can knwo thae same god in the same way that i know him,

 

I'd read that, but it's making my eyes bleed just trying! Text talk is sent by Satan to confuse the world

 

Actually this isn't borne out by the statistics. Christianity has been steadily on the decline throughout Western Europe for the whole of the past century and particularly since the end of WWII. People are not becoming atheists or agnostics so much as turning to alternative spirituality. Churchgoing has been going downhill as has the number of people calling themselves christian at census time... I can't remember the statistic exactly, but it was something like in 1940 50% of the population of Britain went to church regularly and now it's about 7%.

 

no its not!
its just laziness!
and im not very clever at writtin!

 

ok so you think im brainwashed...but please explain to me how i could be? i heard the gospel message so much over my first year in london when i was totally opposed to christinaiyt and i rejected it every time...then i heard it once in the summer at an event i went to completely cynical and god spoke to me and changed my heart...i wasnt persuaded into believin what i believe..if that were the case..each time i heard the gospel surely i wouldve have drawn closer to the faith? instead i ran further! it was in an instant that i was changed through god working on my heart.

as far as vulnerable is concerend..i was a needy as the next person but i wasnt anymore needy that every other time i heard the giopsel preached...i was as vulnerable then as i was when i accepted jesus to be real...im not saying i held no vulnerability or that i was completely fulfilled or whatever..im saying my salvation wasnt brought about because of vulnerability.

i am not sayin i am right...i believe the gospel to be solid truth but i am saying god is right, jesus is right, following christ is the right way to live...not i am right. that probaly doesnt make any sense...what i mean is, im not looking down upon the unsaved world sayin im right your wrong, im living your not...im saying..gods message is right, is truth and its for everyone.

the bible itself says it is alive, it says it is god breathed, jesus told us to depend on gods word...if a christian claims to believe the bible but only in part, they dont believe it at all becuase they contradict the fact that the bible says it is the bread of life and that every word is inspired by god.

i get the point of brainwashing doc..but thanks

 

Sorry, gotta bugger off for the night. Will give you a detailed reply tomorrow

 

Arlia thats really cool to hear. thanks for sharing

 

luchi u kick ass!
i totlay know wot u mean!
who cares if ppl think were brain washed....to tell ya the truth my brain needeed washing!
it was full of craop and bad thoughts abnout myself....self h8 was not gods plan for me!
its sounds that both me and luchi found god whilst we were in a vunerable state,but its not just vunerable ppl that come to god........ppl come to god coz theyre realise that even if life is gr8 as it is,it oculd b so much better with god inside

 

I didn't really intend this thread to be a debate about the merits of Christianity, but I suppose it was inevitable. What I'm interested in is why there seems to be a shift towards a particularly radical, fundamentalist take on the faith as exemplified to some extent by Luchi's quote above.

There are progressive, liberal, tolerant christians who don't necessarily believe the bible is the unadulterated word of god and that we must strictly obey every single word. People who tolerate gayness without condemning it as wrong, people who think women have equal rights in the clergy, etc. These are the christians I almost always came across in my childhood and teens. Now most christians I hear from are yelling and preaching about sin and god's word: fundamentalism.

Where have the progressives gone?

 

i believe the progression you are talking about within christinaity is what i would call false teaching...taking bits of the gospel that you like and leaving out the rest. were taught in galatians 1 how wrong this is and this is why bible believing christinas may come across in a fundamentalist manner...i beleive the gospel message cannot be altered, changed or fragmented.
where as you would name it an increase in radical fundamentalist christinas i would go with the radical but add passionate, zeolous christians who know god, love god, seek god and want to see his kingdom come in their lifetime. and personally, i think this is ace

 

Hehe, this is indeed an example of the phenomenon I'm talking about but it doesn't explain it. Fundamentalist believers might be the wrong people to ask since they have no tolerance for other possible interpretations of the christian faith. Why do you believe there is no scope for other interpretations of the christian faith? Who taught you that the bible is direct divine revelation? Why did you choose to believe it? Is everyone else wrong? Is there no possibility that you are wrong?

I'd be interested to hear from progressive christians if there are any out there...

 

eyah its wrong to take or add from the bible!
ppl who do that are doina gr8 wrong because they are teaching ppl lies!
the ppl who follow those lies are bein faithful in theyre heart,but do not realise that in truth they are bein lied to!
but thats ok,coz thats where god comes in and changed the way ppl think,like he did me!

 

taking stuff out of context in the bible is totally wrong. it says near the end of revelations that adding or taking away from any part of the bible is VERY WRONG. this debate thing is going way over my head and really making me confused now.

 

i know wot u mean!
its all up there,but hard to get down without gettin ppl confissed,wen talin to xtinas i can talk about god easy peasey,but wen talkin to non xtians we hav2 try and put it in a ocntext that we understand.
we will see revivlal in this place........i know things are hpnin,keep pressin on!

 

Yeah we know that's what you believe! But the question is why do you believe it? The argument so far seems to be "I believe the Bible is the direct word of god and must be obeyed in its entirety, I believe this because it says so in the Bible!" This is not an explanation, it's a circular argument.

 

no probs...ppl can try to disprove the bible but they can never take away my testemony,its abouth length of father times beard and its still goin coz im still livin it

 

we believe it because it ahs relevance to life,it gives direction,it uplifts the soul!
..........i ahv a question to ask of you showmet......will u come somewhere to see a man speak about these things that u are asking!
he is the same man that helped me see god word how i see it today,before i herd him speak the bible had no relevance to me and i found it a bore to b quite honest!
i know u live quite neer me,and instead of tryin to debate this,why not invite u to experience it?

 

I know it's a circular argument. I'm just lost in so many words in this thread. I beleive the bible is true because it is the word of God. I beleive it to be the word of God even though it was written by humans because i beleive them to have been directly inspired by God to write these things. I beleive the bible to be true because of historical evidence for Jesus' death and evidence of his life and what he did and the awesome amount of people that followed him. I'm sorry but i'm rubbish at explaining myself but it all makes sense in my head. I'll leave it to the wordy people to explain.