Category: Oneness Pentecostal | Page 55

Living free

I went to a baby shower at a church I’ve been visiting this weekend. I’ve been to lots of baby showers in the church, hated them, and felt guilty for hating them. This one was totally different.

On Thursday, I emailed one of the ladies in charge and asked her if she’d like me to bring a tray of food. She replied they’d forgotten the food, and that would be wonderful, then asked what I would be bringing. I replied briefly a veggie tray and maybe a fruit tray. She said great.

In Pentecostal churches, I have been intimidated to bring food to anything for a long time. What I brought to carry ins was rarely eaten. Ladies would tell me how to improve it, or remind me that they preferred more spices or more meat, or less fat or higher quality ingredients. What I brought to bake sales was set aside on the back corner of the table. My things rarely sold. What a waste of time, effort, and money!

So I went and bought the food for the trays. She hadn’t put limitations or expectations on me, so I was able to be more creative, and wasn’t so worried about what I got. I don’t have to impress these people, after all. If they need impressing, I’ll go somewhere else. It was fun choosing items for the trays, for a change. No agonizing over what fruit would be perfect or whether Sis Snooty would think there was enough. Just fun, making choices and considering what they would enjoy most.

When I got home, I was surprised to realize I had enough for three trays. Crackers and cheese. Veggies. Fruit. Each tray was filled with the things that would keep over night. Then on Saturday I put the remaining foods in their proper slots-even a slot for marshmallows, just for fun, and because I knew any kids that came would enjoy them.

My former church ladies would have had a fit. The grapes weren’t the freshest. They weren’t the largest. There were marshmallows in the fruit tray, and some were quartered regular sized ones, so they were a little sticky. The apples hadn’t been treated with lemon juice. Etc.

The ladies yesterday were just happy to be there. They complimented the trays, and laughed about how much they enjoyed the marshmallows. They chose foods politely, rather than piling their plates high and hoping there would be enough left over for people at the end of the line. They ate everything they chose- nothing was shunned as not good enough once tasted. No one complained about anything at all. It was absolutely amazing, and it was wonderful.

Then came the gifts. Oh, I hated choosing gifts for events in my former church. Once, a lady stopped me in Walmart, looked in my cart, and asked if that was what I was taking to the shower. She asked what else I was buying. I told her that was it. She proceeded to tell me that I needed a pricier brand and bigger box of diapers, took mine away and put her choice in my cart! What an interesting way to be helpful… though I know that’s what she thought she was being. At showers, gifts were always compared. Pricey gifts were expected. Brand names were a must.

Yesterday, gifting was different, too. Each gift was praised for it’s own merit. None was compared to another. None was shoved aside. All were passed around, admired, enjoyed by everyone, and placed neatly in the center of the table, together- not according to who gave what or what was deemed best, but as one large group of gifts, all respected, all admired. None was shoved on the floor or cast into a chair to one side. All were gratefully received.

Again, I was amazed. I have hated showers all my adult life. My gifts were never good enough, pricey enough… never the right brand or the right quality. But this weekend it didn’t matter. All that mattered was that there was a baby coming, and that we could celebrate the coming birth together. Not as family, but as friends, all in our own ways and with our abilities. And isn’t that, after all, the way the family of God should be?

The Few, The Proud, The…

One sign of an unhealthy church is when they teach that almost everyone else is wrong and lost except them. It isn’t speaking of those outside Christianity, but those within. This may also be said of some of the churches within their own organization, if they belong to one.

I remember when my former United Pentecostal Church pastor would say we were the only church in the area with ‘the truth.’ Yet in the nearby town, just minutes away, was another church in our same organization. He felt that pastor was lax on standards as all those attending didn’t fall in line (as if all those attending our church did). He also sometimes spoke against our long-time District Superintendent, Wayne Trout, claiming he ‘stole’ people from our church. I was personally warned about this by him. Through the years I have heard far worse stories than the things my former pastor would do.

Besides believing that outside their doors there are few that are saved, some particularly unhealthy churches also tell their members to not go to any functions at certain churches within the same organization. The reason behind their detest for these churches may be they feel the pastor is lax on the standards, or perhaps not in line with the ‘higher’ standards he holds. It might be that they allow the use of some form of media that is taught against, like filming services. Perhaps he doesn’t like the other pastor for some personal reason. The jealousy between some ministers is a shame.

Some of these elite may even go on to a ‘preferred‘ way, a ‘better’ way, that puts distance between them and those they feel are abandoning ‘truth.’ They will uphold ‘the old paths,’ even though those alleged ‘old paths’ are not found in scripture. You can almost hear them sing, “Tradition, tradition! Tradition!”

An unhealthy church has no problem disregarding Galatians 5:13-15 as they bite and devour one another. What was it that the early Christians were known by?

¹³For you have been called to live in freedom, my brothers and sisters. But don’t use your freedom to satisfy your sinful nature. Instead, use your freedom to serve one another in love. ¹⁴For the whole law can be summed up in this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” ¹⁵But if you are always biting and devouring one another, watch out! Beware of destroying one another. (NLT)

Living for God should not be so hard

Why is it so hard to worship God or have any kind of walk with Him?

I ran across a statement similar to this not long ago, I forget where.

The church I was in, when I was first there, seemed to be fun and I had no idea that worship could be so much fun. But then…but then. We had to be there (in church) as it was a requirement. Didn’t we love God enough? We had to shout and dance and cavort. Didn’t we love God? We had to be there at social functions like a pot luck – 100% attendance for the whole church. Saturday morning visitation in the freezing cold and wind in winter and the hot (95 at 10 am) humid mornings in summer. It was another requirement. After all, didn’t we love God?

If we were not jumping around during song service we were not worshiping. Sometimes the altar calls went to 11 pm. Most of us had jobs we had to go to Monday morning (and Tuesday through Friday too). And get up at 5 am to go to the church to pray before going to work. And then the revivals. One year we were having so many revivals I was nearly exhausted but that didn’t matter. Didn’t we love God?

Then there were the standards of dress and hair. Don’t cut your hair. Don’t even trim off one split end. Don’t even pull out the hard knot, pick it out gently (obviously said by men who had short hair). Skirts down to the ankle. A lot of the young women liked the “pencil” skirts and shuffled along. I sometimes hoped there was not an emergency where they had to RUN out of the church to save their lives. Splits in skirts had to be sewn down to the hem line. (Then one day the Pastor said we could sew them down to 4 inches below the knee which helped some). Sleeves down to the wrist. In our hot Kansas summers we could wear sleeves to just below the elbow. It was still too hot.

If you cut your hair you lose power. If you wore your skirt and sleeves too short someone was bound to be lusting after your knees and elbows. Give a Bible study or go to the “Bad Place.” Speak in tongues every single day so you know you still have the Holy Ghost. Pray an hour a day, everyday. Invite someone to church – oh the contests, we had to see who’d bring the most visitors! Read the Bible through every year.

The list just went on and on. I had lost sight of my Jesus. I did not like what I was becoming – judgmental about those who did not come to our church, the one with the Truth. No other church had the truth like we did. I remember sitting on the pew for awhile, thinking, “Where is Jesus? Where have they put Him?”

At one time, I was told salvation is so easy (pre-Pentecost days): Just believe on the Lord, He is savior and He died on the cross. The cross had all but disappeared. Like Fudge’s book: Christianity Without the Cross. Where had the simplicity of salvation gone? Why was it so complicated?

It was man’s rules that dimmed the hope of salvation and grace. Man’s rules that tried to keep people in control and in a church building. We were told God only lives here in this place. And we believed all this.

I don’t read my Bible every day now. But sometimes I pick it up and read a bit and it seems to mean more than when I rushed to read x chapters every night and felt guilty if I missed a few days reading.

Why should we feel so guilty if we didn’t follow all the rules? Why should we feel ashamed? Jesus did not preach that. Paul did not preach that. The Bible does not teach us to be/feel that way. Jesus really got onto the Pharisees about all their rules and regulations. Why do we need all that?

We don’t. Building a relationship with anyone should not be contingent on rules and regulations And so it goes with God. He loves us unconditionally. No conditions except that we worship him only and know that Jesus is the one who paid the ultimate price. That is why He said “It is Finished” and died.

I only hope and pray that those who are still following so many rules will see the light in Jesus and stop all the nonsense.

Informational post on speaking in tongues #10

This is just a little ‘did you know’ informational post on the subject of speaking in tongues, shared as some food for thought. It is for those reading this blog series who wish to know my beliefs.

I believe in the gifts of the Spirit, including speaking in tongues, and that they are available today. In addition to the nine often focused upon in Pentecostal churches (1 Corinthians 12), the Bible does mention others. Nowhere can I find where the Bible teaches that tongues are necessary evidence of Spirit baptism or a matter of salvation.

There is a wrong overemphasis on speaking in tongues in some churches (as well as an equal lack of emphasis regarding other gifts), in addition to their misuse, like there was among the Corinthian believers. The Bible says very little about speaking in tongues, with the most being found in 1 Corinthians 12 & 14, where correction and teaching were given by Paul.

I believe the Bible teaches that tongues do not have a place in a gathering of believers unless there is an accompanying interpretation or unless there are those present who understand the language(s) being spoken, such as in Acts 2. This is based upon what Paul taught in 1 Corinthians 12-14 with regard to the gifts.

Nowhere in the Bible do I see speaking in tongues as anything more than one of many gifts of the Spirit that a believer might possibly receive. Paul showed that all do not speak in tongues and that we should desire gifts that edify all and not only ourselves.

In none of my blogs am I trying to discredit or say that speaking in tongues isn’t for today. They are not at all trying to take from anyone’s experience. What they ARE trying to do, is put tongues in what I believe to be their proper biblical place – one of many gifts of the Spirit a believer might or might not receive. I see it as nothing more and nothing less. They are also meant to bring attention to instances where things are read into the Bible and assumed, which leads to erroneous teachings. This includes the thought that tongues are an angelic or heavenly language or a groaning.

The main point I am trying to make with these posts is that in the Bible, there is nothing that tells or shows us that speaking in tongues is a matter of salvation, the initial sign of receiving God’s Spirit, or was expected and emphasized as it is today. The truth that it is mentioned so few times in the Bible, with the majority of them being Paul’s instructions on their proper use and showing how they were misused by a group of believers, shows that today’s overemphasis on them- especially in saying they are mandatory- is in error.

We have been taught things about this subject that are not true, often have not compared our practices with what we see in the Bible, and many can only see the teachings and passages through what their church teaches. It is important to allow the scriptures to speak for themselves and not be seen through the glasses of any church or organization.

Guilt Trips

The church I just left taught that everyone needed to pray a specified amount of time each day. I never did follow this teaching since that wasn’t how I was taught by my first pastor. Religious activity just shouldn’t be so forced. And any time I’ve ever been with friends, I didn’t say, OK, I have one hour. We need to spend one hour together. OK, starting… now! And watch the clock for the next hour to make sure I got my time with them in. Absolutely not. So why should I do that to God?

Lately my internal timer has been going off every once in a while… “Mary, you haven’t prayed yet. Mary, pray more! Are you still a Christian? Do you have the Holy Ghost?” Blah. And the annoying thing is that I know it isn’t God doing that- He knows that all He has to do is gently say “hi”- not throw a guilt trip on me- to spend some time with me!

I never did understand that: I was taught that guilt tripping was God. That makes absolutely no sense. If a kid wants to go to the park, you don’t need to say, “Go to the park! If you don’t go to the park, I’ll be angry! I’ll spank you!” Good grief, no! All you have to do is say, “Wanna go?” and you won’t be able to keep up with them, they’ll be moving so fast! So if God has good things for us in prayer or Bible study or going to church or whatever, and we once enjoyed those things and wanted to do them, were eager to do them, why would He start guilt tripping us with those? The answer is He won’t, of course. God knows us well enough to know- He will lead us gently, speak softly, and love us deeply. Sometimes I think maybe He leads so gently that we don’t quite realize we’re being lead, but we are.

OK, now to rambling… I know many people in church that would disagree with the following, and it blows my mind. I’ve seen these people work with their pets, but they don’t think people can be handled with similar compassion. However, when an animal is partly wild or is hurt, a person can approach the animal if he knows enough about it. The animal must be approached a certain way. Most shouldn’t be approached directly. Walk in at an angle, eyes averted, shoulder more toward the animal, and it will feel less threatened. Don’t walk steadily. Walk to a certain distance and stop.

Especially with a small animal, sit on the ground there, and assess the animal’s reaction. Maybe walk backward a little rather than directly to it after this pause. Let it know you aren’t going to hurt it. Reflect its body language if non-threatening- blink slowly if it’s a cat, nod if it’s a horse. No sudden moves, just walk slowly and gently, patiently. Speak softly, in a low, gentle voice. Think calm.

It can take hours or weeks, but the time spent is essential, and if we do it right, eventually that animal will learn to trust. Sometimes I think God does the same thing with us. Not pushing, not forcing, not requiring certain actions from us at specific times, just being calm and letting us adjust to Him.

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