what are you feeling right now? (23)

Im not judging people for struggling with things. I just cant understand the difference between a Christian and an Atheist. They both look the same. I thought there should be a difference somehow. They both argue over politics, both love america, and both seem like the same people to me. What makes an Christian any different? I thought Christians were supposed to seek the kingdom and be untied in love, but instead they seek the american dream and dont have any more love than an Atheist.

Im having serious problems right now. Crisis of faith in the Church

Its like the only difference is that one goes to Church but the other doesnt. Thats not the way its supposed to be.

What is wrong with me? Why do i see this and no one else does? I feel like an outcast, like i dont belong. I feel like i fell in love with God and then got my heart broke by the Church. Am i not seeing clearly? What am i not seeing?

I'll tty all later. If you dont hate me, and if i can still log in.

Extraneous said:

I cant do it anymore. I cant believe in the Church. Im having a lot of trouble seeing how the Church is any different than the world. Atheists and Christians both living exactly the same way. Whats the point?

dont mean to be negative but its how i feel

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Extraneous, "church" is man made organization, institution and doctrine. "THE church" is the Body of Christ. The two are not compatible.

Many people feel they need this structure and are happy integral parts of it. Good for them. It isn't an automatic ticket to heaven; it's how a person lives their life. Many of them don't understand this and some even have the audacity to not care about how others see them because they think they are forgiven and have a get out of jail free card regardless. Nope.

I may get flak for this but I have wonderful relationships with genuine Christians, including 2 pastor friends. Some of these folks attend church and some don't. I have wonderful relationships with non Christians as well.

I have no use for organized religion, haven't regularly attended for about 18 years (partly because of the nature of my job before retiring), and don't plan on resuming.

Maybe it's mainly severe depression, but I have seen so much double living without remorse, been so dumped on by finger pointing devil's advocates calling themselves "Christians" that I want nothing to do with them. I don't trust them. I was in successful full time ministry for almost 5 years and, believe me, even in that organization there was often "no difference". Sometimes I was part of the problem.

I evaluate them as individuals; Christian, agnostic, atheist. Question is whether they live the essence of Jesus' teachings and let themselves be taught of the Holy Spirit even if they are unsure yet of Jesus as the Son of God. It's a process.

Press On said:

Extraneous, "church" is man made organization, institution and doctrine. "THE church" is the Body of Christ. The two are not compatible.

Many people feel they need this structure and are happy integral parts of it. Good on them. It isn't an automatic ticket to heaven; it's how a person lives their life. Many of them don't understand this and some even have the audacity to not care about how others see them because the think they are forgiven and have a get out of jail free card regardless. Nope.

I may get flak for this but I have wonderful relationships with genuine Christians, including 2 pastor friends. Some of these folks attend church and some don't. I have wonderful relationships with non Christians as well.

I have no use for organized religion, haven't regularly attended for about 18 years (partly because of the nature of my job before retiring), and don't plan on resuming.

Maybe it's mainly severe depression, but I have seen so much double living without remorse, been so dumped on by finger pointing devil's advocates calling themselves "Christians" that I want nothing to do with them. I don't trust them.

I evaluate them as individuals. Christian, agnostic, atheist. Question is, do they live the essence of Jesus' teachings whether they believe in him in religious sense or not.

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Thank you. I hope i dont cause you any trouble by what im saying here.
I dont worry much about attending Church. Im ok without going to church. Its the way the Church lives that bothers me. I expected them to do something different than unbelievers. Maybe they would not be perfect, but at least different in some significant way. My idea of different was giving up worldly concerns for politics. I just have a hard time seeing democrats and republicans in one body. They dont love each other. I know because i was heavily into politics at one time. I gave up politics so i could love democrats. I wanted to obey the Lord and love everyone. Its just not logical to me that a christian would be divided over worldly concerns like politics, and it causes a lot of friction within myself. I can understand someone struggling with some kind of addiction because thats hard to overcome, but politics are easy to do away with. I thought we were seeking the kingdom not america? Im confused right now

im going to go rest now. I hope i will be able to see you guys later, and that you wont hate me.

heaLsEarch said:

"The fool has said in his heart, 'There is no God."' (Psalm 14:1 NKJV)


No offense...

The following has comforted me when I was like that.
"The Barren Victory" from "It Is Written" weekly program at www.itiswritten.com

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I'm watching it right now, and none taken Thank you very much Happy Valentine's day to all on CF!

Extraneous said:

im going to go rest now. I hope i will be able to see you guys later, and that you wont hate me.

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I don't hate you. I struggle with a lot of the same doubts you do over church. Actually I don't go. I made my own altar to the Lord and I worship him there. I might go back to church one day. Im just enjoying my solitude for now. Hopefully the disappointment you feel with other Christians doesn't get in between you and God. I think most of us mean well. I like to give everyone the benefit of the doubt. This world can be a very difficult place to live in. Are you on the Internet a lot? I would suggest you don't frequent Facebook and political forums. People have a tendency to say things online they wouldn't dream of saying to a person's face. The Internet can be negative and it's good to take breaks from it so it doesn't overly color your view of people. V

Extraneous said:

im going to go rest now. I hope i will be able to see you guys later, and that you wont hate me.

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Brother, one of the hallmarks of this forum is 1 part brutal honesty mixed with 12 parts unconditional love which is greatly needed on a depression forum.

You wrote your posts while I was busy with my lengthy dissertation and didn't see them till afterward. I just wanted to respond to them.

I didn't get into politics in my rant but politics is definitely a part of my frustrations. I'm a news hound but I find every few days I just have to not watch or read any news because I feel like my life raft is beginning to leak more with each story I come across.

We are not of this world and in reading the Bible it's obvious things as we know it are about to come to a close.

Rest well.

Extraneous said:

I cant do it anymore. I cant believe in the Church. Im having a lot of trouble seeing how the Church is any different than the world. Atheists and Christians both living exactly the same way. Whats the point?

dont mean to be negative but its how i feel

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Don't let other people's hypocrisy turn you away from God. Be better than them.

I was booted off of a Christian forum full of fundamentalists who were more loyal to Ronald Reagan than to Jesus. There was no way I could change their minds but thing is, I'm not responsible for their relationship with God. I'm only responsible for my own.

It may sound a bit cliched but it's true: Be the change you want to see. One day God will judge us all individually. Worry only about your own relationship with God and let the other sort it out themselves with God. I try to serve God through philanthropy while others try to serve God the best way they can. Many don't even do anything but they are the ones who will get consequences in the end, not you.

I'm not that great of an advice giver but just know that there's still people out there who do try to live for Jesus.

Furthermore, there's the parable of the Tax Collector and the Pharisee as mentioned in Luke 18:9-14.

There are two men. One who had a relationship with God and another who believed he had a relationship with God. Though the Pharisee had a form of Godliness with his fasting, prayer and tithing, he was still very worldly with his pride and self-righteousness as well as going after the honor of men and the pleasures of this world.

The Tax Collector was only worried about his own standing with God. He was down about himself about his own misdoings, not the Pharisee's. He humbly asked for forgiveness while the Pharisee only boasted about himself. The Pharisee even had the gall to put down the tax collector in order to build himself up.

Guess who God honored?

Jesus showed the 'righteous' Pharisees their true colors for everyone to see. Jesus became the example we all had to set for ourselves and it resulted in the teachers of the Jewish law trying time and time again to have him removed until they were finally successful. I see that there are a lot of Pharisees in the church today with the only difference being is that they believe they follow Jesus.

Just remember: There will always be people who say one thing and then hypocritically do another thing that ends up hurting another and STILL think they're the good guys. As Tempura said to me, the higher they rise, the harder they fall on the judgement day.

oh brothers and sisters the Churches have failed God's people and God Himself by adhering to doctrine instead of the word of God. I haven't been able to go to Church for many years because of that. Honestly my Church triggers me into major depression just by the way they worship God. However I know that there are many genuine brothers and sisters in Church, it are not the people themselves as much as what the Church leaders have made of Church over the last 2000 years.

My Church reads the bible systemically, John Calvin taught us to do that, and though I like this way of reading over against a lot of other Churches, it is not the way Paul tells us to read the bible.

1 Corinthians 2:6-16
We do, however, speak a message of wisdom among the mature, but not the wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. No, we declare God’s wisdom, a mystery that has been hidden and that God destined for our glory before time began. None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. However, as it is written:


“What no eye has seen,
what no ear has heard,
and what no human mind has conceived”—
the things God has prepared for those who love him—


these are the things God has revealed to us by his Spirit.

The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. For who knows a person’s thoughts except their own spirit within them? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. What we have received is not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may understand what God has freely given us. This is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom but in words taught by the Spirit, explaining spiritual realities with Spirit-taught words. The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit. The person with the Spirit makes judgments about all things, but such a person is not subject to merely human judgments, for,

“Who has known the mind of the Lord
so as to instruct him?”

But we have the mind of Christ.

It is the way we want to read the bible, through the Spirit of God who was given to us because we have faith in Christ. Like brother Extraneous already shared with us a while back - God Himself will teach us individually as well as collectively when we learn to heed His Spirit.

The Church belongs to the true believers so don't let anyone take that away from you. Understand that when Christ comes back Judgement will begin in the house of God and not elsewhere.

So let us all remain faithful to the Christian gospel and seek to deal with our pain and emotions in a non retaliatory way but await our brothers and sisters awakening so that we can all join up with the universal Church of God, which is not build by hands but by Jesus Himself.

God must have a VERY good reason for ignoring my prayers ever since Lent began...

davecn said:

Yo Jeshu...
You know that we are the Church.. followers of our Lord and Savior..
A building with people that make you feel less than a child of God... get out
of there... Let the Spirit lead you to a good fellowship... it may take a while..

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The problem here is that I live in a rather small place and there are no other Churches that I feel more at home in, the one I'm in now is the most biblical of them all and that matters a lot to me. Plus God put me in here so I hope I will be able to challenge my brothers and sisters into seeing the bible as more than literal interpretation of God's word to us. They have been very patient with me seeing I haven't been for ages, and I still have some very close friends in there. Also my down syndrome daughter loves going there and has many people that love her and take her into their homes. My wife has also many people in this Church that she would miss if I decided to move somewhere else.

I rather discuss this with a good councillor and see if I can learn not to be triggered by formalism and tradition when it comes to the worship of God but so far the only advise I've had is to leave the place, which as I explained I don't really want to do.

So I'm a little stuck here

Feeling very tired and empty within at the moment. I haven't been sleeping very well and have increased my medications again to see if I can increase my sleep somewhat for 4 hours a day is not enough to stay sane for very long and that is how much I'm getting lately.

Hoping all of you are doing better than me.

Have a blessed week

Today is Valentine's Day, and about 90% of my text messages to my friends are punny pick up lines and most of the replies consist up, "Step up your pun game." or "Shut up" and "Charming."

In other news, I applied for a new job. Lower pay, but I'll be able to work overnights than during the day and get more hours so I can actually survive. Also I learned, thanks to the application, that depression is considered a disability (I dunno why they were asking that).

Kuriositina said:

I don't hate you. I struggle with a lot of the same doubts you do over church. Actually I don't go. I made my own altar to the Lord and I worship him there. I might go back to church one day. Im just enjoying my solitude for now. Hopefully the disappointment you feel with other Christians doesn't get in between you and God. I think most of us mean well. I like to give everyone the benefit of the doubt. This world can be a very difficult place to live in. Are you on the Internet a lot? I would suggest you don't frequent Facebook and political forums. People have a tendency to say things online they wouldn't dream of saying to a person's face. The Internet can be negative and it's good to take breaks from it so it doesn't overly color your view of people. V

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Thank you sister. THe Internet is a huge part of my struggles i think. You're correct that no one is perfect, and im surely not, its just that i struggle with faith when i see what i described earlier. I don't know what to think exactly sister, im just living day by day, trying to live like we all are. Thank you so much for your kind response.

Press On said:

Brother, one of the hallmarks of this forum is 1 part brutal honesty mixed with 12 parts unconditional love which is greatly needed on a depression forum.

You wrote your posts while I was busy with my lengthy dissertation and didn't see them till afterward. I just wanted to respond to them.

I didn't get into politics in my rant but politics is definitely a part of my frustrations. I'm a news hound but I find every few days I just have to not watch or read any news because I feel like my life raft is beginning to leak more with each story I come across.

We are not of this world and in reading the Bible it's obvious things as we know it are about to come to a close.

Rest well.

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I think that the news and politics was not good for me. I believe that perhaps it fueled my depression