Tuesday, March 03, 2015

No Fear In Love




I was eight years old.

Image courtesy of Photorack.net



Do that again and you’ll get a spanking.
Study harder or you will fail.
Break the law and you will go to prison.
Use protection or you will get pregnant or an STD.
Scream, bitch, and I’ll kill you.














I couldn’t take any more.




Jesus is not the point of this play, that’s why.







    Says who? Like you said, there is no evidence of this at all except for the book (if you read it the right way, like you said.)

    Fear of the unknown, I guess that's what hooks us, we all fear dying I suppose and who really knows what happens after that?

    1. The unknown is terrifying, and when someone suggests that something like hell is a likely possibility of what happens after, then the unknown becomes even scarier. But, well, has anyone died, gone to hell and come back? (Interestingly enough, people only ever claim to die and go to heaven then return to life to tell us about it. Hmm. So only Christians get the luxury of a second chance at life? No one ever visits hell then gets resuscitated?)

    2. Have you ever heard of the Book "23 Minutes in Hell?" Bill Wiese supposedly goes to hell and comes back to tell about it. I listened to the audio book as a believer and then later read a looooooong debunking of the idea from a biblical perspective (the latter was from a Universalist site http://bible-truths.com/23-minutes-in-hell.html). I also read a lot of Catholic mystics who claimed to be shown images of Hell so that they could warn others.

    3. Never heard of it Alice. Sounds really interesting though. Maybe I should add this to my Reading Challenge List! (Need a book with a number in the title!)

    4. Well, that would certainly make for interesting reading:)

  2. Anonymous12:48 PM

    Lori, I'm sorry you went through that kind of superstitious crap as a kid--or even as an adult. Totally unconscionable and irresponsible to present that as "gospel". Might make good Halloween entertainment but should be prefaced with a disclaimer.

    A "right reading of The Book" would always begin with what the Book records as Jesus' own words about himself in relation to the Father, "The person who has seen me has seen the Father." When God the Father is depicted as being something different that what we see in Jesus then that depiction/interpretation is questionable--to say the least.

    For instance, Jesus tells us to " love your enemy and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be like your Father in heaven," The pagan morality play you describe above depicts a god who is held to a lower standard than us and is actually WORSE than we are.

    I can imagine a situation where those who promote the nonsense you've described will be asked, "why did you talk about me in a way that was in direct contradiction of who I revealed myself to be in the person of my Son Jesus?"

    That foolish, superstitious morality play does NOT bear any resemblance to Jesus and our Father. Rather, it bears a striking resemblance to another god named Molech.


    1. Tom, I totally agree. This kind of thing is not Biblical. Even my very Calvinist dad would agree with that! (He hates this play.) Sadly however, this is so mainstream as to be called "Christian" and not some weird sub-sect of Christian.

    2. Rather, it bears a striking resemblance to another god named Molech.

      Very interesting.

  3. I really hate altar calls. Hate them. We were looking for a church after we moved, and we visited on that seemed okay until the end. Then the pastor started an altar call. He began with, "If you need to ask Jesus to be your Savior," and continued on in degrees until he was demanding that everyone who "...has ever used your words unkindly with another person and needs to ask forgiveness," should come forward. Like, who in the world has never spoken an unkind word? What in the world was the purpose of that? I stood there feeling angry, a first time visitor, forced either to lie and pretend that I have never spoken an unkind word, or else go forward and make a scene as a first time visitor (and an already saved one, even). I started to shake, and as soon as the moment released, I was out of there, practically leaving my husband in the dust. We drove through a tornado on the highway on the way home. Seriously. This is the truth. I decided to take it as a sign not to go back there. I get so sick of manipulative people trying to impersonate the Holy Spirit, so sick of it. The people who ought to be afraid are the ones going around obfuscating the gospel and obscuring the beauty of Christ. C.S. Lewis once wrote that when we get to heaven, we very likely will be surprised to see who is there, and who is not there.

    1. I hate them too, Ruth. They are very manipulative. And that scenario you described is so common! That's how I felt here. Like everyone was being coerced into coming forward so they could announce at their next board meeting how many hundreds of people came forward. Because it's not very impressive to merely say "Three people were saved last night". It's much more impressive to say "Two hundred people came forward."

      I hope the church you finally found is edifying and building you up. :)

  4. (not that I would have gone back there anyway, but I decided to take it as a sign of God's endorsement of my decision.)

  5. It does bother me that if Christianity is true, why does it seem to depend so much I fear. And also that those Churches that are trying to take the fear of Hell away are in major decline. This does give me cause to think a lot.

    1. I've never thought of the possibility of non-hell-believing churches falling into decline... I wonder if that's true? It would sure make sense, though that would be sad. If there are going to be churches for centuries to come, I'd like them to be non-hell-believing ones!


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