Why was christianity so dark in the past?

[stiller]

I am going through a book called Power and the Pulpit in New England which is about the puritans of the first few generations in New England in the 17th century and I am absolutely sickened by what was going on back then theologically.
The author refers to diaries from puritans who lived back then and also other documents from pastors in these times. There was one pastor called Increase Mather and the author talks about how he scared christian children and told them that they would stand naked before God on judgement day and that every sin would be exposed and that their parents would stand on God's side and agree with God judging them and this way he instilled fear in them of going to hell and also being separated from their earthly parents! Totally unbelievable stuff!
Or he also talks about diary entries from young puritan males who felt totally condemned when they had sexual dreams or wet dreams and they totally obsessed with this and thought that this means that God gave up on them. And some of them fasted and prayed against sexual temptations until they got physically sick and then ate again and then the temptations came back and then they fasted again.
And when the ministers noticed that the puritans in the 2nd and 3rd generation weren't as pious and the first puritans they advised the parents to be stricter and they preached more against assurance because too much assurance was negative and lead to antinomianism in their opinion but demanding stricter rules didn't help and only made the believers feel worse and some of them became alcoholic or killed themselves. They also preached an angry God and told the puritans of these generation and they were corrupt and separated from God and that there was nothing they could do about it!
The stuff which I read in there about what was taught in these times is totally sick and also so sad and I'm sure if we had lived back then we would have been as miserable and as afraid as those young puritans. Or do you really think you would have seen through this and stood up and declared that this is wrong?

I ask myself how can it be that in the past christians obsessed with stuff which today nobody would obsess with? I mean a wet dream, big deal.
Are we today simple smarter or are we simply less godly and not they were wrong but we are wrong and we've become insensitive towards sin?

Or what if we are also wrong and 100 years from now christians hear sermons from our time and shake their heads about how strange things we believed?

I think it's really discouraging when you read about christians in the past and find out what they believed and how they suffered from fears which seem totally absurd today. But then again the very same could apply to us, too, if future christians read about us.
It simply seems all very senseless and the quest for truth seems like wading through the fog. I bet that the christians in the 17th century all thought that they know how it works and that they know how God is and that God is an angry God who will expose all our sins on judgement day and will totally humiliate us and that this is how God is and we today would shake our heads at that and wonder how they could believe such a thing.

This is really discouraging. It could either be that we are much further today and know much better how God really is or it could also be that we are much more wrong today and that our view of God has been corrupted by our desires and that we think that God's nice and forgiving because it's more convenient than praying on your knees in fear for hours every day like those christians did in the past.

And what I also ask myself is were there no christians back then who also preached real grace and who did not terrorize the christians and who had a revelation how God really is? Or was every christian back then tormented by fears and thought that if he gets a wet dream then this means that he's totally corrupted and that God has probably forsaken him?

 

[Jim2011]

Im sort of divided on the answer.

I wonder if the sermons mached the enviornment. Judging from the pictures I have seen of midieval paintings many people looked....unhappy...life back then was more difficult.
Was life more dificult for Rev. Matters? Was there more misery than there is today? Was starvation looming if the rain failed? or if it DID NOT stop raining? Was life crummy so...God is angry?
Sorry God, that probalby was more flippant than I would have meant it to be.

Other idea. < Maybe just because I am feeling frustrated and depressed.> Were they right? Am I just so utterly wicked that I should just give up? Should we spend long hours praying for mercy?

Im sorry that I cant give you a better answer, its late, Im tired, and frustrated, and confused.
Good night all

 

[OpenDoor]

Sadly for the majority of "Christian history", what was thought as Christianity was really politics.

 

[Blueforest]

Christianity does not have a dark past.

 

[Emmy]

Dear stiller. When we read from the Old Testament how cruel and bloodthirsty Man was, it seems unbelievable, and when Jesus showed us God how God really is, we can only marvel at what Human-Beings are capable of, and how long it takes to change for the better. In Matthew, chapter 22, verses 35-40, Jesus tells a Lawyer what God is really like, and what God wants from us. God wants our Love, selfless and helpful in all its Greatness. God is Love, and still there are men and women who will tell us differently, who show us God as hard and unforgiving unless we do as we are told. They believe that Love is soft and a way out for soft people, and in reality, Love is all-powerful, Love changes people and circumstances, and Love will lead us home to where we came from, Jesus is The Way and the only Truth. Jesus told us: " Unless ye believe as children do, ye will not enter God`s Kingdom." If we would let Love lead us and guide us in all we say and do, life would be much happier and uncomplicated. Paul tells us in 1) Corinthians, chapter 13, verses 4-8, what Love really is: not only a good feeling, but also a verb, (doing-word) and can do all we need, poor or rich, old or young. Christianity was dark in the past, stiller, but we can help change it to become what Jesus wants: A loving relationship between our Heavenly Father and His children/sons and daughters. I say this with love. Greetings from Emmy, sister in Christ.

 

[Nanopants]

I approve of this thread.

I remember clearly that when I was about 5 years of age, all of the little kids in our Baptist church were taken down to the basement where we were told gruesome stories about going to hell and burning alive. It should be no surprise that my faith was worthless to me as I grew up and fell away into agnosticism.

Stiller, you should know that Christ repeatedly commanded: "Be not afraid" (6 times in the gospels, once in the book of Acts). I suggest that you think hard about that, and let those words sink in for a while.

 

[DamianWarS]

we are a people corrupted by sin. When we have the wrong focus we will expose our corrupted selves. The fruits of the Spirit are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control and the greatest of these is love. If those fruits are not a part of us then the Spirit is not a part of us. I know each has their own calling from God and obedience will look different among us however if we do not embody the fruits of the Spirit than it is not of the Spirit. In the long off future people will still recognize the Spirit in the things we have done and will also be able to recognize where the Spirit is not. It is our responsibility to take the right focus and be led by the Spirit.