Pull up a pew and join the Christian chat thread, continued...

[EddSimcox]

Church chat and all related things... weak coffee, dodgy tunes, rubbish attitudes... and the uplifting, inspirational, and hilarious too.

Back from four days away - glad you all had fun! If there's another hopefully I'll be able to make it.

Hello! Can I join in? please?

Hello! Can I join in? please?

Hello! Can I join in? please?

Sorry for multiple posts...sigh.

You can join as many times as you like, Insieme. Take a pew. Tea or coffee?

Hello Insieme! So pleased to see you here :) 🍰

Welcome insieme- everyone is lovely with lots of support, prayers, discussion and sound advice. Some are lurkers, some are regular posters, some more sporadic (me!).

Hello, I wanted to join the thread. Long time church goer. My husband doesn't go but is a believer (he doesn't feel the need). Trying to do the Women's Living Well summer bible study at the moment, my first time studying.

Welcome Claredemon. Two newbies in a day, that’s lovely. Hopefully you will feel right at home here.

Hello Claredemoon and Insieme - lovely to see you both.

I'm in the middle of planning activities for our children's holiday club at the moment and finding myself thinking, "really? in this heat? are we all bonkers?" - and then I remembered that we are providing lunch for children who might not otherwise get a meal, and got a grip on myself.

@Niminy that's sounds fantastic, love to hear what you come up with, we are starting a Sunday School up at ours in September and need some ideas

And hello fellow newbie @Insieme and thank you @Dutchoma

Thank you @dutchoma. Coffee would be very nice!

Hands Insieme a coffee in a mug with a picture of the church on it. No biscuits. Just read most of your thread on AMA. Very brave.
One thing I learned from Bishop John Pritchard is that God’s judgment does not mean condemnation. I’m still trying to get my head round that, but I think it means that God is greater than we think He is and that He can judge without punishment and make things right in ways that we cannot even dream of.
That sets me at odds wth evangelical thinking, but has liberated me at the same time.

Just read some of your thread Insieme - you are very patient and very clear. Even though I'm in a slightly different place to you theologically I admire you for taking all that on (mind you I only got to p4 ).

Oma it's also the case that God's judgement and God's mercy join together in some way that we can't understand - they are in some way part of the whole of God's love.

Niminy, yes, that’s what I mean. There are so many reasons why people aren’t Christians and I trust God enough to believe that He will be righteous, if, maybe, in our eyes not “fair”. (Think of the parable of the workers in the vineyard)

Yeah, dutchoma, one problem I have on the AMA thread is that I'm not actually a very conventional evangelical, considering the theological position of the church I go to! Some of the things I believe in would probably horrify my pastor a bit (like my view that gay marriage should be legal, and that I'm not as pro-life in every circumstance as they would like).

I'm very aware that there are many areas where Christians disagree, but in the end that doesn't matter too much as we agree on the basics. So it's been great to get some different views from Christians, while still being nice to each other!

Thanks for the coffee. What do I have to do to get cake? Hmm? 😁

I’m afraid Isieme if you want cake you’ll have to bring it.

Now, are you really saying that gay marrage should be legal, while asserting that you think a homosexual relationship is a sin? Or did I get that wrong?

Yes, I am saying that! I'm saying that the bible says homosexual acts are wrong. I know not everyone agrees, but I do believe that. (I'm not trying to start a row here).

But the vast majority of people in this country would disagree with that, and I don't think it's right for me to impose my view on others. So I think gay marriage should be allowed (although I'd never campaign actively for it).

To take a different but related idea as an analogy. I think sex before marriage is wrong, but I wouldn't want it to be illegal! People who aren't Christians (and some who are) may want to sleep with people they are not married to, and it's not for me to judge them. That's between them and God, ultimately.

As long as I'm trying to live how God wants (even not very well), then I'm not going to unnecessarily make things difficult for people who believe differently.

But it's not easy to explain to people who just want to shout 'bigot' at me. 😁

Gosh Insieme wow. I never venture onto most of MN so I’d never heard of AMA. But it didn’t take long to find! Very impressive —though like Niminy I couldn’t manage he whole thread—

Welcome claredemoon too.

That is very much how I feel, both about sex before marriage and homossexual ascts Insieme and I have had the ‘bigot’ slung at me. I think that there probably is a seizable minority in the country who think the same, but are afraid to speak out.
And freedom of expression should mean that you are allowed to think differently from the majority, but on this score it does not.

Welcome claredemoon!

I think you expressed it all really well Insieme and didn't come across as a bigot in any way. It's got really long now, well done for keeping going with it, I tried to join in a while but not very consistently so I'm sorry for that! I'm also loosely evangelical though really don't like to align myself with the term when it's interpreted as the very conservative US Bible belt way of thinking. I prefer 'open evangelical' - in a way evangelical is simply a term meaning the spreading of the gospel so it covers all of us in some ways. But it's become a problematic word sadly.

@Insieme

I've read some of you AMA I'd love to have a discussion with you. It's so interesting how we all have different thoughts about things.

Not all Christians believe Gods role is to judge or punish. I very firmly believe Jesus came to tell us we missed the whole point.

We are all already at the party, we always were. That's the good news. We are all of the father and all creation is connected.

Ooh, was yours the Evangelical Christian AMA?

I attempted a response a couple of times and failed I'm afraid. I'm a lesbian and a Christian, and while my theology differs from yours in that I do not think that God requires celibacy from homosexuals, I also don't think that evangelicals hate me. That's just baffling.