Tag Archives: Baptist

I felt the Presence of God

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feeling_god

As a Christian, I felt the presence of God many, many times. I felt God moving and working in my life. I felt God speaking to me. There were moments when I was overwhelmed with the presence of Almighty God. I just knew God was right there beside me.

My experiences were very similar to the experiences of others in my religious tradition. Have you noticed that people who are from the same religious tradition tend to have the same religious experiences?

Baptists rarely, if ever, speak in tongues, yet people in the Assembly of God or the Pentecostal church routinely speak in tongues. Why the difference?

The answer is quite simple. We tend to mimic the actions and behaviors of the groups we are a part of.  We want to be accepted; we want to feel that we are a part of the group. What better way to show that you are a part of the group than doing what others in the group do?

I spent most of my life in the Baptist church. While Baptists have a common doctrinal heritage, Baptist churches can have quite diverse practices. Baptist churches in the North are much more staid, whereas churches is the south are much freer.

I grew up in churches where people rarely said amen or expressed their emotions during church services. I remember going to a pastor’s conference in Rossville, Georgia where I was exposed, for the first time,to  Baptist worship Southern-style. Preachers were hooting and a hollering, standing on the chairs, running the aisles…pretty much like Pentecostals except no one spoke in tongues, (unless speaking with a heavy Southern accent  counts as speaking in tongues)

When I was the pastor of a Christian Union church I attended a pastor’s meeting where they had a season of prayer. Ok, I thought, praying is praying, right? Nope. Everyone in the room started praying out loud. I thought, how can God make sense of this noise? Smile  After a short time of this, the praying died down and the pastor of church closed the prayer time with a prayer. I experienced several more prayer meetings just like this and EVERY one of them started and ended the same way.

So when a person says, I felt the presence of God, their experience must be judged in light of the religious culture they are a part of. While I can make no judgment about them feeling the presence of God since feeling anything is a subjective experience, I can try to understand how and why they had this experience.

All of the subjective experiences I had in church must be judged according to the religious culture I was a part of.  As I look back on these experiences I now know they were driven by a deep emotional desire  I had to be connected to something bigger and outside of myself.  Little did I know that something bigger and outside myself was the ceiling of the church. Smile

How about you? Have you ever had a time where you felt the presence of God? If you are now an unbeliever, how do you explain your experience? Please share your story in the comment section.

Why Churches Cancel Services on Holidays

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This Wednesday is the Fourth of July. Wednesday is also Prayer Meeting night in many Baptist churches.

If you were raised like I was, the pastor drilled into your head the importance of attending church every time the doors were open. Especially on Prayer Meeting night. On Prayer Meeting night you came to church to get your spiritual gas tank filled. Spiritual, sold-out, consecrated,on-fire Christians made Prayer Meeting an absolute weekly essential. Miss Prayer Meeting and risk backsliding.

Except…when Prayer Meeting or Sunday services fall of the day of a Holiday. All of a sudden attending church every time the doors are open is optional. Countless Baptist churches will cancel Prayer Meeting on Wednesday so everyone the pastor can spend time with his family or go away for a family get-to-gether.

When holidays fall on a Sunday churches will often have a service on Sunday morning. They will then cancel the evening service. Why not cancel both services? Are you ready for me to share a dark secret from the never before revealed Pastor’s manual?

Thou shalt always have one service on Sunday so you can get the money.

Pastors know if they don’t collect the offering on Sunday many people will not double-give the next Sunday.

Bruce, you mean it is all about the money? Sadly, more so than most pastors would ever admit. (budget pressures are a constant problem. God is not very good at paying his bills)

The next time you see a pastor cancelling a service so people can spend time with their family just give him that, I know better, look. The truth is pastors and their parishioners like holidays just like the rest of us and are quite willing to jettison “attending church whenever the doors are open” when they need to. I just wish they were honest about it.

Is the Baptist Church to Blame for the Right Wing Craziness in America?

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Take a look at this map from the latest U.S. Religious Census. Keep in mind, this map only reflects Protestant church concentration.

It is clear, from a Protestant perspective, that the Baptists are the dominant religious force in America, especially in the south.

If you look at ALL religions in the Unites States this is how the map looks:

One thing is clear….Baptists and Catholics rule the religious roost in America.

What two religious sects are behind the current culture war in America?

The Catholics and the Baptists. (along with the Mormons)

It is good to know who we are fighting.

Get Out of Jail Free Card

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If you have ever played Monopoly you know how important it is to have a “Get Out of Jail Free” card. You never know when you might need to play the card.

Christianity has several “Get Out of Jail Free” cards. Every Christian, regardless of the sect, gets one “Get out of Jail Free” card. This card is also known as the blood of Jesus.

According to Christian teaching, the blood of Jesus cleanses a sinner from their sin. The Bible says in Hebrews 9:22-28:

And almost all things are by the law purged with blood; and without shedding of blood is no remission. It was therefore necessary that the patterns of things in the heavens should be purified with these; but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands, which are the figures of the true; but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us: Nor yet that he should offer himself often, as the high priest entereth into the holy place every year with blood of others;
For then must he often have suffered since the foundation of the world: but now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment: So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation.

Ephesians 1:7 says, In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace.

Through the blood of Jesus sin is atoned for. Through the blood of Jesus is the forgiveness of sin. Baptist readers of this blog have sung the old Baptist standard, Nothing But The Blood, many, many times:

What can wash away my sin?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus;
What can make me whole again?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.

For my pardon, this I see,
Nothing but the blood of Jesus;
For my cleansing this my plea,
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.

Nothing can for sin atone,
Nothing but the blood of Jesus;
Naught of good that I have done,
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.

Refrain sung after every verse

Oh! precious is the flow
That makes me white as snow;
No other fount I know,
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.

Exactly what does the blood of Jesus do for the sinner? It covers, erases, does away with their sin. According to 2 Corinthians 5:17:

Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.

Through the blood of Jesus a sinner becomes a new creature (creation), old things pass away and everything becomes new. In an instant a sinner, no matter how wicked and vile they are, can have the slate wiped clean.

God, through the blood of Jesus,forgives and forgets. Perverts, wife beaters, tax cheats, thieves,murderers, and Newt Gingrich are quite happy to find out that the blood of Jesus provides for them a “Get Out of Jail Free” card. The blood cleansed sinner can shout from the mountaintop, Free, Free, Free at Last! In a moment all their past transgressions are “under the blood.” Psalm 103:12 says:

As far as the east is from the west, so far hath he removed our transgressions from us.

A popular Christian song, My Sins are Gone, pretty well sums up the Christian’s feeling about the blood of Jesus and their sin:

You ask me why I’m Happy So I’ll just tell you why
Because My Sins Are Gone
And when I meet the scoffers Who ask me where they are
I say My Sins Are Gone

They’re underneath the Blood On the Cross of Calvary
As far removed As darkness is from dawn
In the Sea of God’s forgetfulness that’s good enough for me
Praise God! My Sins Are Gone

When blood bought Christians are confronted by those they have hurt in the past they often say………that’s under the blood. This means…sorry…..God has forgiven me of that sin and I am not accountable for it any longer. PRAISE JESUS!!

My mother was sexually molested by a relative who later became a Christian. My mother confronted this relative over what they had done to her as a child….Their reply?

That’s under the blood,God has forgiven me!

My mother, in a fit of rage, let the molester know that SHE hadn’t forgiven him. But, that didn’t matter. As long as the blood of Jesus had paid the sin debt no further confession or restitution was needed. This relative went on to live the Christian good life, never saying to my mother, I am sorry. This relative was a mean son-of-a-bitch before they became a Christian and they were are mean son-of-a-bitch after their sin debt had been cleansed by Jesus’ blood.

What about sins committed AFTER a person becomes a Christian? Each sect has their own plan for renewing the “Get Out of Jail Free” card. Catholics use the confessional and transubstantiation to free themselves of responsibility for their sins. The blood of Jesus covers everything, including molesting children.

Baptists use daily prayer and the Church altar as places where a Christian can reappropriate the blood of Jesus and get a fresh start. The Bible says in First John 1:9:

If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

No matter what the Baptist has done, absolution is only a prayer away. Do the same sin tomorrow……..no problem………just pray….and start over again. I know some of the more pious among the Baptists will object and say that when a Christian confesses their sin they are to forsake it, BUT personal experience and observing Baptists for many years tells me that “Do the same sin tomorrow……..no problem………just pray….and start over again” is typically how Baptists handle their “sin problem.”

As an atheist, I don’t have a “Get Out Of Jail Free” card. When I do bad (I don’t believe in the Christian concept of sin) things there is no God to excuse me so I must own my actions and, if possible, make things right. Granted, my sin list is much smaller now. Once I was set free from the shackles of God’s law, Biblical Law, whatever the hell the pastor says is sin IS sin Law, I was finally able to begin living my life freely. No blood atonement needed. No catchy songs about the blood covering all my transgressions.

Every day I make decisions in my life that affect how I live my life. Every day I have the choice to live a decent, honorable life. Every day I come up short and it is in those moments that I must say, I am sorry and, if needed, make restitution.

For my mother……..one I’m sorry would have covered a multitude of sins. Too bad Jesus and His blood got in the way.