Growthtrac Community

[webacus]

I don't know really what a brother or sister in Christ is supposed to look like or act like, but I am discouraged that many times I get treated more as a stranger or at best distant cousin. Am I making sense? There's got to be a better way...

Yea, I hear that term thrown around (over used) frequently. Ahhh gotta love that church-ese

Really, any other born-again believer is a brother (or sister) in Christ.

Personally, I consider my (real) brothers in Christ those believers
who are in my inner circle. Guys who I can share stuff with and
who hold me accountable. These are the relationships I'm the closest
to-- guys I do life with.

As an example... this pastor you mentioned, might
potentially fit the above description.

[Æ]

Where is your wife at spiritually?

I can not give a full answer. She says she was saved at some church camp in Nebraska when she was 8. And her whole family was involved with the church (Nazarene I think) most of her life.

I was saved at 18.

We've both had our periods where both us were apathetic or one of us was a bit more jacked for church than the other. For a while it was her, and I could care less.

Now it's flip flopped, yet she claims I have nothing to do with it.

If I had a word to honestly call it... I'd go with lukewarm, either way I don't recall a time I've ever seen her pray or read her bible. Then again, I do most of my praying and reading in solitude so I don't really ask her what's going on in her heart. She might take offense to it.

[webacus]

Well, people do have seasons or stages
where their spiritual lives dive, grow,
plateau, burnout, etc.

She might want to recommit someday.
I've found sometimes adults who received Jesus as a child
kind of get lukewarm, or lose relevance as they get older.

Especially if as a child they attended a denonination
that was heavy on rules & religion.

[Æ]

I remember hearing about a book something like "why men hate the church" and the crux of the supposition is that church has been largely feminine for so long... so passive, so geared towards feminine thinking.

To the ladies reading, I'm not bashing you at all.

But imagine the response one should expect when someone gets saved. I got mainly a group of ladies sorta blubbering and ooo-ing and awww-ing at my "decision".

And it reminds me to this day the same effect I feel every time I hear a blubbery, rice-cake tasting Chr. music on the radio or church.
I'm sorry ... but that was lame. Put it back on ZZ top -- Jesus Just Left Chicago.

As a male when I think of winning souls I want monster truck rally cries or grand slam homerun hollers or 99 yd touchdowns... "YEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!!"

NOT... awww bless bless yay welcome yadda yadda hugs tears etc.

Picture every time a lost soul gets saved the angels are all doing the Tim Allen grunt "roo roo roo roo roo..." I can't type it.
But it says in the Bible that the angels rejoice over 1 newly saved human. I have struggled and struggled over what the word "rejoice" really means to me.
I'm American-Italian (not Ita-Am, there's a difference ), and of course I "rejoiced" over the Italians winning the world cup. When the feed cut over to the scene at the Circus Maximus there were over 100,000 romans jam packed waving flags, cheering, REJOICING... all over a silly little ball kicked into a net.

If churches took seriously their role in winning souls for God, instead of trying to run a 3rd rate shopping mall that doubles as child care & babysitting business, then maybe I'd feel a lot better about taking seriously the Word of God instead of "66 Jewish Chronicles and Letters."

It's no wonder I felt cold almost immediately after I got saved.
"Ok, I'm in... I think... uhhhh.... now what?"

[webacus]

Amen.

This morning I heard Brian Littrell on the radio (to those who don't know,
Brian is a Christian artist, also in the Boy Band Back Street Boys)...
Anyway, I'm listening to this song and I think, "Man this is very rice cakey..."

Scary, huh?

[CornerDweller]

I can empathize with a lot of this. I have very idiosyncratic tastes in music. I like what most people could never stand, and cannot stand what most people like. Even most headbangers couldn't tolerate the stuff that I love the most. Japanese noise, free jazz, grindcore, noisecore, no wave, stuff like that. Stuff that will never, ever, ever see the light of MTV or FM radio.

Since contemporary church music these days is especially innocuous, it's like harsh teeth-grinding noise to me. I mean, I could dig it if it was Bach, Handel, etc., but who even has that kind of budget? (For starters.) I have Asperger's Syndrome and we're very easily irritated by any number of sounds. A ticking clock can be enough to make us reach for a hammer to lob at it. Going into a K-Mart where some Muzak rendition of "Candle in the Wind" is lilting away would be like taking a normal person, strapping them to a plank, and suspending a gas-powered leaf blower two inches above their nose.

So that's how I am with music. But since I have to be getting back into church real soon here, I guess I'll just grit my teeth for God.

Also, when it comes to sermons... well, my senior pastor for years and years (whose daughter I dated ever so briefly) is now a professor at a theological institute. I always liked listening to his sermons, even though they went right over most people's heads. Other churches I've been to, it's been more difficult to get into the messages. And man, I really miss the bible studies he would give. It was like being in a graduate school seminar presided over by a top expert. Those were just great.

As far as instruction and whatnot, I get the most out of sitting across from my one friend at Denny's. Though this was back in L.A. He'd be working on his M.Div. or his Th.D. right now were it not for circumstances.

And I'll confess, the absolute worst is when there are too few women. Or rather, too few single women who are in my age bracket. For some reason I always ended up in churches where these were an endangered species, verging on extinction. Mind you, there'd be no shortage of similarly frustrated, increasingly bitter young men who felt like they were getting the shaft... but the young women were either taken or non-existent.

People tell me that over in the Bible Belt there are churches just bursting at the seams with this particular subspecies. Well, welcome to the West Coast. In particular, welcome to Las Vegas, Nevada, which is a lot closer in nature to Los Angeles (my hometown) than it is to... uhhhh... Tuscon? Well, heck, Vegas makes L.A. look like Savannah, Georgia. It's rough, man.