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Starting today August 7th, 2024, in order to post in the Married Couples, Courting Couples, or Singles forums, you will not be allowed to post if you have your Marital status designated as private. Announcements will be made in the respective forums as well but please note that if yours is currently listed as Private, you will need to submit a ticket in the Support Area to have yours changed.
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CF has always been a site that welcomes people from different backgrounds and beliefs to participate in discussion and even debate. That is the nature of its ministry. In view of recent events emotions are running very high. We need to remind people of some basic principles in debating on this site. We need to be civil when we express differences in opinion. No personal attacks. Avoid you, your statements. Don't characterize an entire political party with comparisons to Fascism or Communism or other extreme movements that committed atrocities. CF is not the place for broad brush or blanket statements about groups and political parties. Put the broad brushes and blankets away when you come to CF, better yet, put them in the incinerator. Debate had no place for them. We need to remember that people that commit acts of violence represent themselves or a small extreme faction.
DanielGarneau
I became a Christian in 1977. I clearly understood that I was leading a life that displeased God, although I had been considering myself as doing no harm to anyone up to that time when I began reading the Bible for myself.
Changing my attitude, ways of thinking, of doing, and of being, required a decision on my part which I was not willing to make at first. I believe today that this refusal was what eventually led me to declare myself an agnostic.
But, as a self-declared agnostic I could not explain how a God that does not exist could have answered one of my «If you exist, then you must...» type of prayers I had made earlier on, when seeking God and asking Him to reveal Himself to me.
That answered prayer nagged me until such a day I realized agnosticism was not a valid world view, and decided to turn away from the life I had been living up to then, and to begin living in ways taught in the Word of God.
This led me to become dynamically involved with sharing my faith all around me, up to a point when I joined a «servant in training» program, preparing for what turned out to be a Church Planting pastoral ministry.
I was devastated when I came to realize – in 1987, after eleven years of training and ministry – that there were issues in my personal life that would not just go away, and that I had to make a choice that involved stepping out of full time Church leadership, and going back to secular work.
I decided to stay in the small Church I had been the founding pastor of, but soon realized people kept coming to me with situations that the new pastor was teaching and leading in ways that were sometimes opposite to what I had done. So within the same year that I had left full time Christian ministry I also felt I needed to move to a different local Church.
From 1988 to 1987 my family and I worshipped and shared about God and His ways in a non-denominational Christian assembly called "La Bonne Nouvelle" (Good News). It was a good Church, and it helped us in our spiritual walk. But a situation came up that led our family to join a start-up local Church involving leaders that were from the same denominational background that we were.
So, since 1988 we have been involved in a second non denominational assembly called "La communauté chrétienne des Deux-Rives". The name has to do with the fact that our members are spread out on the North and South shores of the city we live in within the Province of Quebec, Canada.
It was not until 2008 that came about a life-changing insight, which I am convinced was from the Holy Spirit of God, and which led me to confess my sin in a specific area of my life I had let myself slip into. As a result of this, and of several other factors that were part of God's outworking, I began to experience a deep and permanent joy I had tasted before, but that had not been my daily lot.
My family, and the people who had known me for years, asked me what had happened. But I could not and still cannot explain it really. However, I do know that even when we are convinced that nothing will ever come of our life again, because it did not turn out as we wanted it to, God is there doing His work, and leading us to greater knowledge of Him.
Changing my attitude, ways of thinking, of doing, and of being, required a decision on my part which I was not willing to make at first. I believe today that this refusal was what eventually led me to declare myself an agnostic.
But, as a self-declared agnostic I could not explain how a God that does not exist could have answered one of my «If you exist, then you must...» type of prayers I had made earlier on, when seeking God and asking Him to reveal Himself to me.
That answered prayer nagged me until such a day I realized agnosticism was not a valid world view, and decided to turn away from the life I had been living up to then, and to begin living in ways taught in the Word of God.
This led me to become dynamically involved with sharing my faith all around me, up to a point when I joined a «servant in training» program, preparing for what turned out to be a Church Planting pastoral ministry.
I was devastated when I came to realize – in 1987, after eleven years of training and ministry – that there were issues in my personal life that would not just go away, and that I had to make a choice that involved stepping out of full time Church leadership, and going back to secular work.
I decided to stay in the small Church I had been the founding pastor of, but soon realized people kept coming to me with situations that the new pastor was teaching and leading in ways that were sometimes opposite to what I had done. So within the same year that I had left full time Christian ministry I also felt I needed to move to a different local Church.
From 1988 to 1987 my family and I worshipped and shared about God and His ways in a non-denominational Christian assembly called "La Bonne Nouvelle" (Good News). It was a good Church, and it helped us in our spiritual walk. But a situation came up that led our family to join a start-up local Church involving leaders that were from the same denominational background that we were.
So, since 1988 we have been involved in a second non denominational assembly called "La communauté chrétienne des Deux-Rives". The name has to do with the fact that our members are spread out on the North and South shores of the city we live in within the Province of Quebec, Canada.
It was not until 2008 that came about a life-changing insight, which I am convinced was from the Holy Spirit of God, and which led me to confess my sin in a specific area of my life I had let myself slip into. As a result of this, and of several other factors that were part of God's outworking, I began to experience a deep and permanent joy I had tasted before, but that had not been my daily lot.
My family, and the people who had known me for years, asked me what had happened. But I could not and still cannot explain it really. However, I do know that even when we are convinced that nothing will ever come of our life again, because it did not turn out as we wanted it to, God is there doing His work, and leading us to greater knowledge of Him.
Member statistics
- Website
- http://www.savoiretcroire.ca
- Region or City
- Quebec
- Country
- Canada
- Gender
- Male
- Faith
- Christian
- Occupation
- Writer and editor at www.savoiretcroire.ca (Knowin
- Marital Status
- Married
Contact
- daniel.garneau.14
- DaGarneau
Signature
Daniel Garneau, BTh, BCom, MA, Christian author and editor,
Savoir et croire .ca : Knowing and Believing – Torn-apart, yet inseparable allies…
"Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts" (Col 3:16),
www.savoiretcroire.ca
Savoir et croire .ca : Knowing and Believing – Torn-apart, yet inseparable allies…
"Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts" (Col 3:16),
www.savoiretcroire.ca
