Fellow Church People

[WubbaWubbaWubba]

This thread piqued my curiosity. I myself am Catholic, and have spent the last five years teaching catechism to kindergarten students. The only con to this is trying to structure sixty minutes of class time into segments before the students lose attention of the subject at hand. However, I do put my faith in God to help me stay focused and help my students grow in their young faith with God.

I was asked today by my DRE to take part in a special Lenten bible school of sorts beginning this Sunday. Seeing as I do not give up anything for Lent (rather, I believe in giving something back), I was glad to give up a few Sundays of what normally would be just sitting around watching television and give more of my services to Christ.

I have to admit now that I'm not exactly great at public speaking, but the only thing that I really have to do is memorize just a few lines and demonstrate my yet-to-be-developed spice grinding skills. I look at it as learning along with the participants in the program. I actually have the reading materials on my desk in front of the computer screen right now, and I'm enjoying reading about what life was like in Jesus' time.

 

[dwayne1115]

My Church History

This is going to be long so bear with me. I feel the need to share this because it is something on my heart, and I can not seem to shake it. I feel that i got out lucky, but that so many other people incudling my own family that didn't and my heart is hurting for them.
When i was about 15 me my Mom and my Brother moved from east Tennessee to Nashville. We did not have anyone really down there for suport or anything but where trusting God would give us a good church and good friends. There was a part of me that did not want to leave because me and my brother where preety big players in our youth group. We had lots of friends, and I even think the pastors daughter had a crush on me. Needless to say we moved, and where in search for a good church.
Now we had always belonged to a Southern Baptist Church, and we really enjoyed them and learned a lot. When we got to Nashville we found a small SBC church, but we really didn't feel at home there. We had seen a little store front church next door to where my mom was working, and thought it would be interesting to at least try it out.
When we went we where shocked at the things we heard and saw. They taught us that there was really only one version of the Bible the KJV, and that all the other Bibles have taken verses out or added to the Word of God. They taught us that as church members we where supost to do preety much everything the Pastor said, and better not ask any questions. We where even taughted that you can not date in that church, but you have to go bcak to the old coutship ways.Which BTW no one in the church knew anything about,
We stayed and learned and took everything in, and our lives changed. We took a strong stand aginst our family becuase they where not living as we thought they should have been. We felt that we had really became close to God, and that we where in his will. Then mom had questions in her mind about how some things where being done in the Church, and we where thrown out. This really hurt us all we had never been kicked out of church before, I had always thought Church was a place to get help not get kicked when your down. We had become so involved in the church it was preety much our lives, and now we had no place to go.
well My mom knew that even though we where hurt we still needed to go to church, so we found ourselfs another one. This church was a little bit like the other one, but a little losser in some of there teaching. There We became real close to the pastor and the youth pastor. The pastor became one of my Good friends that i could talk to about anything, and the youth was shuch a helpfull person with my brother they grew real close. We started doing some work for the church. Before it was all said and done we only had one night a week that we where not busy with doing something for our church. Life once agian was going great, and all was well .
I turned 18 and thought it would be wise if i moved out of my moms house. All i really wanted to do was look for girls and watch movies. Mom thought i was really going down hill, and that i needed help. She thought if she went back to the church we got kicked out of that my life would get fixed. This caused me and my mom to fight, because i really didn't want to leave my church and my friends. To make this long story a little shorter i started going back to that church.
When i started comming back there was a girl there and she was so wonderfull. For a long time i could not even talk to her because i was to scared she would hate me. Needless to say when we started talking to each other we could not stop. She told me things that she had never told anyone else, and we both knew that we felt really strongly about each other. There was one big problem I did'nt have a clue how to go about courting her. As all that was going on mom got re married to her ex husband, and he really didn't care for the church. they ended up leaveing once agine. The battle was even more great now with my mom because i was in love and didn't know how to tell the one i loved her. Needless to say I left her and joined my mom back at the other church.
Now there is more to the story but i will contiune it latter. This is already a long post and i need to rest my fingurs.

 

[MartyMuppets]

Great testimony so far Dwayne. I'm looking forward to the rest of it.

And may God bless you too WubbaWubbaWubba.

 

[CensoredAlso]

Seeing as I do not give up anything for Lent (rather, I believe in giving something back), I was glad to give up a few Sundays of what normally would be just sitting around watching television and give more of my services to Christ.

Amen to that! Lent should be about giving something back and improving the world, rather than just giving up chocolate or meat.

 

[dwayne1115]

My Stroy part 2

As Paul Harvey would say “And now the rest of the story” This part of my story has to deal with something that may not for all ages. So please read cautiously when I left the church where I had a relationship with the girl that I thought was going to be my wife. I was starting to get into a depression, and it was going to get worse before better. With all the drama that was going on within my spiritual life, there where problems going on at the store that I worked at...
Paul Earhart who I had been working with for three years had become very sick and unable to work. I had become very close to Paul because when I first started working with him he would hardly smile laugh or talk for that matter. I made it a personal goal of mine to at least get Paul to laugh one time... One night I had found this toy frog and when you squeeze it would expand under it mouth with glitter in it. I kept playing with it until I squeezed it to hard or something and it popped. Water and glitter went everywhere, but mostly on me. I was hoping no one would have seen it, but then I heard someone right behind me laughing. It was Paul, he had seen everything, and was dying laughing at me. From that time on Paul was laughing a whole lot more, and he also began to open up to me about himself. I found out that he did not believe that there was a God, and he really didn’t like anyone who was a Christian. He knew I was, but I told him that I would not “preach’ to him. Well after about two months of Paul being sick he had turned up missing, and was not retuning anyone’s phone calls. On a day that I was off a customer that really liked Paul wanted the store to call the police to at least check his house to see if he was ok. That same day the police found that he had killed himself, and they came and told everyone at the store. That next day I came to work and found out the awful end of my dear friend. My whole world felt like it was ending, and I didn’t know how to stop it or even I wanted it to stop.
After losing Paul and the girl I was in love with, I felt I could never love anyone again. I felt like a had let God, and Paul down by not showing Paul the Gospel. I knew that his blood was on my hands, and there was nothing I could do about it.. The last bit of my story I will share latter it does get better.

 

[MartyMuppets]

Aw. I deeply sympathize with you Dwayne.

I haven't been around very often but do please share the rest of your testimony. I pray that it is doing you some spiritual good to openly talk about it in my special thread.

 

[Gonzo14]

has anyone here ever repeatedly gone through struggles, i keep falling into the same sins over and over again and i always say i'm done, but i never am. Any other christians here (or anyone) ever been through this and have suggestions, i think i need an anonymous group to talk to and this is the perfect place since i've gotten to know some of you without actually meeting

 

[dwayne1115]

Hey Gonzo! I think I know what you talking about, and If you want to have a heart to heart talk PM me my firend.

 

[CensoredAlso]

I think that's true of everyone. We all have our faults and we struggle with them all our lives. Everything I have ever learned says it's not what happens to you in life, it's how you deal with it. You will mess up, often. It's how you learn. What matters is if you pick yourself up and start again. I personally think that's what God is looking for.

If it's something serious, obviously I'd recommend counseling or something similar. Never wrong with asking for help in life.

 

[dwayne1115]

Well I'm really the type of person who tries to live by the Bible. Thats the way I was taught. I beleve that we all sin (Romans 3:23 & 6:23) However Jesus Christ Died and and to **** for three days to pay for our sins. On the Thrid day he arose from the dead, as he had said he would. Jesus is still alive today, and he is up in Heaven speaking to God on our behalf. When you ask Jesus to come into your heart (Romans 8:9-10) he lives inside you. That means you have to work on becoming more Christ like, and thats not really all on the outward things that people think of. It really has to do with having love paitens and treating your fellow man with respect. There are many people in the Bible who have gone through many problems that we still go through today. We could study what thouse people did, but the one person that we should look to more when we have a problem or something is Jesus Christ. when you read about somthng that Jesus went through read it in all four Gospls you will be suprised at what you will find out.