Between Two Worlds

"Don't go to that kind of church!"

"What kind of?"

Many people I meet often ask me about the church I attend/attended to, I think it's fair.
I also receive questions, especially when they try to reconcile the different denominations of churches we have.

Still fair though, different background and upbringing results in different types of perspective.

Yet, I found some of them sighed slightly after hearing my answer and tried to suggest as if I'd made a mistake in choosing churches.

I respect these people, I truly do, and yet somehow I felt that I came to a better understanding of what Pastor Steven experienced when the pastor he "learnt from" back then in seminary called him "Unqualified".

I kinda remembered that one day, a person I love did an almost similar thing, what he told me implicitly was something like, "let's talk about this person's bad habit. You know, it's for evaluation for us to be better person". 

I appreciate the thought of getting things right, to learn from someone else's wrong decisions, so that we can be a better person, but as I love THAT PERSON as well, I was hurt whenever this conversation took place.

As you might've heard, I went to several hand-clapper kind of church, was planted in one at a time and grew spiritually and mentally through the process God's entrusted to that community.

They shaped me to be who I am now.
Are they perfect?
No.
Are they the most complete church in the world?
No.

I admit, WE (not they) DO have weaknesses... 

Many times I argued with people who have this mindset about the always-loving-and-will-never-get-angry and loving-the-sinner-without-rebuking-the-sin Jesus.

I thought (and often asked them): "what kind of theology is that?", "who taught you that?", "which version of the Bible have you read?"

Because in my Bible, Jesus got angry as well...

Jesus loves you but He also asks you to carry the cross.

The purpose of creation and salvation is not about you, it's about God's glory.

The true faith we often mention ought to be : A faith that BOLDLY asks God for the impossible and yet still trusts Him whatever happens.

Especially, I always have a hard time when people picking this verse and that verse only to support their ideas. You need to read THAT verse altogether with its WHOLE passage, y'all...

By the way, against all myths you'd heard, I consulted this issue to my pastors and received a good response. Thus we made improvement and became more alert to this issue, like how we address many different issues happening within the church.

Nevertheless, as much as I find this kind of struggle in this one denomination of church, I find the same thing within churches from other denomination. 

You copy? This IS NOT a struggle that is experienced by one or two churches because of their beliefs, this is many churches' problem regardless their denomination.

That's why we need Holy Spirit and sound doctrine of the Bible to bring us to true revelation about who Jesus really is.

Sound doctrine is a must for every church, otherwise they are not teaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ, in spite of all the worshipping sessions, workshops or sermons they have.

"Worshipping God is only valid if we do it this style" is something I felt they tried to tell me additionally. 

I'm sorry, but as I learn the Bible, I also learn about the way King David worships God.

How people enjoy worshipping God, how they enjoy learning Jesus' teaching, how they enjoy spending time at Jesus' feet.

People with "intimacy" approach should learn how to properly pay a respect to KING Jesus, as well as those with "grand worship" should learn to be intimate with God as a Father. Again, I believe there's nothing wrong with these styles, when the sound doctrine of Jesus Christ is being taught at church and applied in the congregation's life.

I also find it hard to believe to say that God doesn't speak to us anymore, because some people, even pastors for instance are often found to say that "God called me to be a full-timer", "God wants us to serve here", or something like that. 

If you really give a thought about it, you WILL NEVER find a person named Indra in the Bible, man... 

So, what does that make me? A person excluded from God's equation of His purpose-revealing roles?

Don't get me wrong, I believe that the Bible is the ultimate, obvious, and solid Word of God. Anything contradicts it, doesn't come from God, full stop. 

Therefore, what you perceive as "God's voice" will never contradict the Bible.

I hope, at this point, you have known that you really need to read your Bible.

Before joining ANY church, you need to test their teachings, whether or not they align with the Bible.

However, I also believe that the Word of God is living and active, it is still relevant even until now. Furthermore, through Word of God as our lens, God can bring everything around us to confirm His message for us.

I pray that we can identify and understand more about what we have believed and what other people have. I'm personally still learning from many sources, really, I am, until now.

Well, I'm not saying that there are no such things as false teaching, false teachers, false prophets and stuffs, the Bible is clear about this, I'm saying that too often people categorize churches from different denomination into this same category of satanism.

Perhaps we are not lost as you'd thought we were... 

Perhaps without your realizing, we'd also been in the house of our Father all this time.

We are far from perfect, there are many rooms for improvement, and surely we do mistakes, thus don't stop growing and learning about God's truth. But at the same time, please love each other through your supports, warnings and constructive feedbacks.