From There to Here

Gee-whillikers--it's COLD today! We were lucky enough here to escape the biggest part of the ice and sleet that fell last night, but the local schools still dismissed for the day because of the weather. The roads aren't horribly slick, but there's just enough ice out there for some good ole' boy in his big 4x4 to say to his passenger "Hey, watch this!" Heh heh heh. Another good thing--MD is showing now more symptoms of his stomach virus! YAY! He's back to his bouncy self and is singing his ABCs again.

As some may have gathered from my general information, I do consider myself as "Christian." I'd like to share some background on my past religious history, just so you can know where I came from, where I've been, and where I am now.

The very first church I can ever remember attending was an Assemblies of God congregation in a neighboring city. (Yes, that's Sarah Palin's denominational affiliation.) From a young age, I heard the fire-and-brimstone preaching, I heard the speaking in tongues, and I basically thought that every church everywhere did the same kind of things in their services. Independent Bible study was strongly encouraged, so I did get a good general working knowledge of scripture from my years spent in this church. Because of a bad experience with a pastor in the church involving the embezzlement of LARGE sums of money, my family became rather disillusioned with the denomination as a whole (NOTE: I know that not all pastors behave as such. It was a personal family decision at the time). From there, I think my parents put a whole bunch of possible church home choices in a hat and picked one out, because our next church home was at our local Methodist church. Pretty big jump in more ways than one! We went from rumpo-jumpo to calm and orderly in one fell swoop. So now I was learning another church doctrine--one that was a bit more liberal and forgiving than that of the Assemblies of God. During our time at the Methodist church, my mom and dad divorced, which came as a hard blow to me, as I was about 15 at the time...but that's another story for another time. After the split, my dad and I stayed at the Methodist church. My mom, on the other hand, converted to Catholicism afterwards, and she still holds her Catholic beliefs today. For several years, through my college years, actually, my dad and I were content at the Methodist church. However, little by little, we started noticing that our church was too middle-of-the-road on many issues. Our little church was starting to fizzle out spiritually, and we were both looking for...something more in the spiritual sense. It just so happened that we were invited to the town's Church of Christ by the lady that my dad was dating (and later married). The church's no-nonsense, Bible-based beliefs clicked with us, and we each felt like we'd found what we were needing spiritually. I was very happy for a couple of years. My growth and learning as a Christian during this time was phenomenal, and I was living my life as a Christian should. I'm not going into all the events that led me away from that particular church, nor will I get into the whole mess that my life became for several years...just suffice it to say that I fell away from Christ for a while. The important thing is that I have found my way back. I'm still looking for a place to call my church home, though I seek God's knowledge every chance I get through Bible reading, prayer, and devotions...and through discussion with like-minded people, of course. I guess what I'm trying to say through all of this is that I've had a varied denominational past, but each set of experiences has built upon the other to bring me to where I am now. I prefer to think of myself as a "Christian" rather than as a member of any particular denomination. I'm still learning, but hey, who isn't?? This isn't exactly an area where you can say "Ok, I think I've learned enough about God."

That's all I shall ramble on about at this particular time. It's much-needed nap time for Mr. MD, and I have to get a heads-up on tonight's supper. Have a good day!