| Author | Message | ||
| Grace_alone Registered user Username: Grace_alone Post Number: 685 Registered: 6-2006  |
Did you ever become close enough to a regular Christian to get "confused" about regular Christians? In other words, did you ever feel like maybe the regular Christian was perhaps one of those exceptions to the SDA rule? I think I'm trying to get into the minds of my SDA family. None of them ever question me, and my mil even shares her faith with me in a way that my Christian friends do. Almost like she trusts that I understand how she feels. Is there a point to where you saw Christ in non-SDA people? Am I making any sense?  Leigh Anne | ||
| Colleentinker Registered user Username: Colleentinker Post Number: 6330 Registered: 12-2003  |
Yes, Leigh Anne--I did know some Christians who "confused" me. Originally I thought they were "true believers" but just hadn't heard "the truth" clearly enough to embrace it. I figured they would be saved eventually-- Later in my life I came to believe that there were some Christians who would likely be saved even without the Sabbath if they accepted Jesus and lived up to "all the light they had" with sincerity. By the time I thought non-SDA Christians might be saved without becoming Adventist, I was moving "perilously close" to having my own eyes opened--but didn't know it. I figured that they were people who would be saved and, if the time of trouble came and the Sunday law really happened, they were true believers and would accept the Sabbath before Jesus came. The last people I believed this about were our neighbors with whom we studied the Bible in the mid-90's. You know the end of the story--we began to see things we had never seen, and we ended up leaving Adventism. For years, though, we experienced a great deal of dissonance over these thing--but I always figured the "true believers" would "come around" when the heat was on. Colleen | ||
| Reb Registered user Username: Reb Post Number: 398 Registered: 5-2007 |
I was terrified of "regular" Christians when I was an Adventist. All I could think about was how they were going to hunt us down when the Sunday Laws came. My wife and I one time witnessed to a friend who was Muslim. This friend accepted Christ but became a regular Christian and not an Adventist. We were disappointed theat even though our Muslim friend accepted Christ she didn't become SDA. Now looking back on it I think, good for her! | ||
| River Registered user Username: River Post Number: 1087 Registered: 9-2006  |
Leigh Anne, My Adventist friends have come right out and said in public they feel like I am a true Christian, their words, not mine, I don’t know whether it confuses them or not, they know me and they know I am not Adventist, they probably hope I will become one, I suppose people in Vegas can wish for snow in July but they didn’t have much luck yesterday. I don’t beat on them, what does that make me, a hypocrite? All I do is love the Lord and love them, if I get to resenting them I bring it under control and pray it out and it leaves. I am in contact with them seven days a week. Like you, I wonder what they are thinking and then I leave that with the Lord to, I think she trust you because you love her. Maybe I am wrong. At the end of the day, all I feel I can do is pray and leave them in Gods hands. River | ||
| Lori Registered user Username: Lori Post Number: 62 Registered: 11-1999 |
Leigh Anne, Seeing Christ in someone who was not a SDA is really what made me wonder, "What's wrong with me?" I saw it in several people. I could see they had peace, assurance and trust that I didn't have. Sadly, there is only one SDA that I can truly say I saw the peace and joy of Christ in. He always spoke of Jesus. I chalked up his "overflowing joy" to a personality thing which I would never have. I haven't undergone a personality change since I left the Adventist church, however, there are times that I do share Christ exuberantly. Over 20 years ago, I can remember an Adventist pastor who used me as an example to a Sabbath School class. (I was extremely shy!) He used me as demonstration that in the end times even someone like Lori will stand up and proclaim the truth. He was right!! (Just not in the way he expected.) It was actually my non-sda husbands trust, peace and security in the trials of life which really made me question why others something spiritually I didn't have. I was in God's remnant church!!! That's when I began to pray for God to help me find His truth. Lori | ||
| River Registered user Username: River Post Number: 1088 Registered: 9-2006 |
Lori, trust, peace and security in the trials of life is the mark of a mature Christian, A Christian can harp a good tune verbally but when the troubles come then we see how he stands up or if he /she goes to whining or not. Wouldn't you say? River | ||
| Grace_alone Registered user Username: Grace_alone Post Number: 686 Registered: 6-2006 |
Thanks everyone! Maybe that's where my in-laws are with me. As long as they've known me I've been an active Christian, and I sang special music at their church a couple of times. They were kind enough to visit my church when our kids were baptised. (I also had them dedicated at the SDA church) When I first met my husband we were still teenagers and his parents did all that they could to either break us up, convert me, and finally they sent my husband up to LLU when I know they couldn't afford it, etc. Of course, I had no idea of what I was getting into!! Now that I do know, after being on the FAF for a year, I'm amazed that my husband married me in the first place, and that my in-laws are so loving towards me. Maybe I'm hoping that I've changed their minds a little about regular Christians. I won't fool myself though, they're still very active SDA's. I never thought we'd love each other so much! Leigh Anne | ||
| Jay_g Registered user Username: Jay_g Post Number: 14 Registered: 7-2007 |
I guess because I was a 1/2 bread (SDA Mom/Baptist Dad) I wasn't confronted with this as an SDA. We always had some really good non-SDA Christians in my class, probibly the most Christ Centered people in my Adventist Grade school were non-Adventists, and there was never any talk about them not being saved or true Christians. My Dad is a the head deacon in a Baptist Church. I remember being in Sabbath School and the teacher said that even though he wasn't an Adventist you could tell that he knew Jesus or had Jesus in is heart. Most Adventists I met in 5 years of grade school, 4 of Academy and 4 of college, in addition to the church itself always said that non Adventists who knew Jesus would be saved. We also made distinctions between to Pope and the Papacy. Kids especially in younger grades would sometimes (especially after the assassination attempt in 1981)say things like "he's Evil" and the correction was always made that John Paul II isn't evil the institution is. There is a duality in teaching when it becomes abstract while talking about EGW and Revelation. On the one hand we would attend a sunrise service with the other Churches in Town and pray together, and share in our experience in Christ, one week. Then the next week there would be a sermon about how we would be persecuted by the same Christians in the future? Its much harder to point fingers at real people as you call them by name, than it is to generalize about them. Mostly there was this idea that eventually if they really know Christ they will be come around to becoming Adventists the message hasn't been reviled to them yet. | ||
| Freeatlast Registered user Username: Freeatlast Post Number: 531 Registered: 5-2002 |
It was precisely my experience with non-SDA Christians - and especially non-SDA ministries - that amplified my on board cognitive dissonance to the point where my mind cracked open just enough to consider an alternative to SDAism. If I had only been exposed to evidence of doctrinal error and false prophecy without any relationships with non-SDA Christians, I think I'd still be an SDA trying to convert them to "the truth". | ||
| Asurprise Registered user Username: Asurprise Post Number: 59 Registered: 7-2007 |
When I was an Adventist and I met someone who was obviously a Christian; I would almost be hesitant to clue them in on the Adventist "truth," because I almost didn't want to put that burden of the Adventist "truth" of the "Sabbath" and avoiding "unclean" meats on them. I just figured that in the end times, they'd come around to the "truth" of Adventism. Dianne | ||
| Flyinglady Registered user Username: Flyinglady Post Number: 4011 Registered: 3-2004  |
I was exposed to a very good practicing Christian young man at my first job out of college. He tried to tell me about the new covenant, but I would not listen. In the meantime I had all my cousins on my Mom's side that are Catholic and a favorite Uncle, Mom's first cousin, who is a Catholic priest. I never really believed the stuff about the Catholics because of my Mom's family. They did not practice their own religion, so why would they persecute me. Uncle A is a fantastic man I love him dearly. Then in my 12 step program I met some sincere Christians who knew God. So, little by little, God was showing me that there were Christians out there who were not SDA. Diana | ||
| Loneviking Registered user Username: Loneviking Post Number: 565 Registered: 7-2000 |
1/2 bread!!?? I'm gonna have to remember that term! My mom was SDA, my dad was Church of Christ. I figured out fairly early that there were some good Christians outside of Adventism. I just felt sorry for 'em as they didn't have 'the truth' and might be lost for not having that. |
