| Author | Message | ||
| Asurprise Registered user Username: Asurprise Post Number: 1148 Registered: 7-2007 |
I'm curious what all your experiences are, what changes have happened in your lives after you've transitioned out of that false church...... I'd like to start this thread by saying that one thing is what I think of Heaven. When I was an SDA, my biggest ambition was to go explore the galaxies, enjoy the good food, etc. (The things I could enjoy.) Now, I'm still looking forward to those things, but they're not first place anymore. Now, the main thing I'm looking forward to is just being with God! | ||
| Flyinglady Registered user Username: Flyinglady Post Number: 7860 Registered: 3-2004  |
A big thing is I KNOW that God cares about me, every little thing about me. It can be spiritual, emotional or physical, but HE CARES!!! Thank you awesome God. Diana L | ||
| Jonvil Registered user Username: Jonvil Post Number: 333 Registered: 4-2007 |
I now look forward to going to church, I use to dread it. John | ||
| River Registered user Username: River Post Number: 5911 Registered: 9-2006  |
I think your still looking forward to exploring the galaxies and eat food is an Adventist leftover. Are you still eating Adventist leftovers? Where do the Adventist get the idea of whizzing around the galaxy and pigging out, and all this angel watching over us stuff anyhow? Yall shore are a strange bunch, don't get me wrong, I think its cute, but still a strange, strange, bunch.  River | ||
| Julieb Registered user Username: Julieb Post Number: 7 Registered: 1-2010 |
Uneasiness about the close of probation and whether I "will be" saved has been replaced with the assurance that I am saved because of what Jesus did for me. Hallelujah! | ||
| Dennis Registered user Username: Dennis Post Number: 1858 Registered: 4-2000  |
Sylvia and I are most grateful that our sovereign God didn't leave us where He found us. Truly, He restores the years that the locusts ate--nothing is lost. Best of all, we have discovered the awe-inspiring gospel of Jesus Christ. Soli Deo Gloria! Dennis Fischer | ||
| Philharris Registered user Username: Philharris Post Number: 1966 Registered: 5-2007  |
What has changed for me? Well, many things but one thing stands way above all else. In meeting my Savior I now have peace. Things like the issue of the Sabbath, eating unclean foods or drinking alcohol were important but not critical to me. At age six I simply invited Jesus into my life, simple as that. Up to then, my folks had never taken me to church, let alone an SDA church. Dad hated Adventist and mother never was one to ‘make waves’. Grandmother said we needed to go to church so I insisted we had to go. Along came the SDA teachings and with that was the idea I had ‘to do things’ if I expected to go to heaven. For two years life was good. Then two events occurred that changed my life. So bad I don’t wish to share what they were. It was then I started having nightmares. The most obvious symptom was chronic bed wetting which my parents had no idea as to the cause. One of the reasons I personally think there are demonic influences is that these nightmares always became intensified when we visited my grandparents at Angwin. They were even worse when we moved back there for two years. When they first started, we were living in Upper Lake, California. When returning home we would stop at a view point on Mt. St Helena and watch the sunset while looking over the Napa Valley. Instead of injoying the sunset, I would see the valley as a vast darkening emptiness and the thought would come that all of life and the universe was a meaningless empty nothingness that only existed in my mind. One blink and all would be an eternal nothingness. I have never been so lonely in my life. (My nightmares occured both while asleep and awake.) Many years later someone prayed for me and became my friend nonstop for two years. Finally, I surrendered to the leading of the Holy Spirit and this passage came alive and changed my life: Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written, "For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered." No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Rom. 8:35-39 ESV) Never have I had a nightmare since. God’s peace in my life changed everything. Fearless Phil | ||
| 8thday Registered user Username: 8thday Post Number: 1453 Registered: 11-2007  |
Phil, I can relate to your nightmares! I had horrific dreams on a regular basis but have not had any in the last three years! Not like those. Praise God for your deliverance from that! My life has changed... I no longer judge people by outward appearances but love them where they are and know when they meet Jesus, the outward appearance will change on its own. (okay.. I'm not perfect in this.. but it's coming). I am free to just share Jesus without having to lay on people a burden of false obligation toward God as a test to see if they will follow Him or not. I go directly to Him for answers through His Spirit, not a commentary from one person. And He answers, guides, convicts, empowers, transforms. It's WOW... not "ugh.. do I have to?" I have bond with sisters and brothers in Christ, all over the world from different backgrounds and in different churches - but so strong I would throw myself under a bus for them. Never experienced that before. No more dread about the future, even though I am well aware of the times we are living in. I read the Word of God and it is ALIVE.. it jumps off the pages into my being and I can't wait to get into it every day. I love worship, both alone and with others (still coming out of my shell in that area) ... could just do that for hours. Who needs a sermon??? Before.. 3 songs.. let's get it over with and study. Now I am sad when we have to stop. And I find myself doing it more and more on my own. I could go on all day... Sondra | ||
| Martinc Registered user Username: Martinc Post Number: 114 Registered: 9-2006 |
I was a proud, Fringe-Agnostic, quasi-Christian Adventist. I thought I was enlightened, but I was actually confused, gutless and dishonest. What? Me an Adventist? What makes you think that? Observe--and brace yourself! Well, I had not identified myself as Adventist for 26 years, but in so many attitudes I really was. Adventist thinking filled a spiritual vacuum that was only replaced by the Gospel and the Spirit. Probably the first change: My fear of death mostly left me, and continues to subside as Jesus' power and presence become more real. Knowing that we're not just material beings, that our life is hidden in Christ, that we've crossed over from death to life, that we'll never die; that knowledge destroys fear. Before, His influence seemed a little spooky, and just a theoretical subject for debate on Sabbath morning discussions. One of the comforts of Adventism is the belief that the greatest proof of God's love is shown in His respect for My choices and My feelings. This is especially true for liberal Adventists, which I was. Because my will was more important than God's, I was at the mercy of my own whims and feelings. No assurance or rest there. There was such pride and striving to feel masterful and in control; that house of cards fell down very suddenly. What a relief, we don't have to know everything, and constantly prove it to others! With the pride also went the anger and much of the irritation towards people. The sense of grace upon grace for a wretch like me--that's liberation! Martin C | ||
| Martinc Registered user Username: Martinc Post Number: 115 Registered: 9-2006 |
But River, you really must understand how important it is to fly around all the galaxies and witness to all those unfallen beings out there. We tell them how we were saved, that we can keep the Sabbath, and prove how God is really, really fair. Don't you want to feel safe from the aliens distrusting God and rebelling like we did? It always made perfect sense in Sabbath School class, I guess you just had to be there. | ||
| River Registered user Username: River Post Number: 5914 Registered: 9-2006 |
Yeah Martin, it almost makes me want to be a Adventist! I know about fallen beings, I fell off a 20 foot ladder once and saw stars when I hit the ground. I had a real aposipesis, but recovered quickly and went into a vernacular description of my distaste at being fallen, and the whole fallen world at large, not excluding distant far off Galaxies and anyone who might inhabit them. River | ||
| Martinc Registered user Username: Martinc Post Number: 116 Registered: 9-2006 |
Well, see, you proved to the stars that the law of gravity can be kept perfectly. A few more trips up the ladder and you'll be there! More seriously, I want to thank you River, for your encouragement about my adult son awhile back. That's been a long, hard road. Martin C | ||
| Colleentinker Registered user Username: Colleentinker Post Number: 10866 Registered: 12-2003  |
Now I'm content not to have all the answers. I can not know how things may look—like the sequences and events of eschatology—and it's OK, because now I know WHO it's about. Now I find the Bible alive and deep and limitless, and I love church, and my existential anxiety is gone, and my fear of death is greatly reduced, and I no longer feel so dependent upon people approving of me. I am finding that Jesus is faithful, and He provides for and affirms His will and truly gives me Himself. Sabbath rest is palpable—every day. SO much is different; I can trust Him with the people in my life, and I am far less "controlling". I feel more internally relaxed. It's amazing really...yeah, Martinc, that business of vindicating God's fairness to the universe was a never-ending burden that simultaneously fed the ego... Colleen | ||
| River Registered user Username: River Post Number: 5915 Registered: 9-2006 |
Faith is pretty hard to come up with when you pray, and they get worse, or you see no change as the days go into months and the month turn into years. But this is exactly the kind of faith God looks for. Jesus demonstrated this when Lazarus lay in the tomb, beyond hope, his body already decaying. But when God speaks the elements obey his voice, all of them. Jesus said if men did't praise him the rocks would cry out. Pretty difficult to imagine a rock speak, but he was not speaking metaphorically. Faith looks beyond circumstance, time, distance, or opposition to it. This is the faith that will see that loved one changed and saved. Not a faith that looks at the situation and bows it head in defeat. Human reasoning will look and say, "Impossible" but with God all things are possible. The faith chapter of Hebrews tells how women had their dead brought back to life, this is not a demanding faith, but a humbling faith, and a total bowing the heart before our resource for all things. Faith needs to exist in the heart before it asks, and this can only come from a constant humble love and trust in the father. If you have to dig it up every time you need it, you don't have it. Faith has to live inside of us, just as it lived in Jesus. Jesus was faith in the flesh, and still is faith in his glorified form. When we see him as he is, the nail prints will still be there, and all creation will bow before him that bled and died. Let your faith reach out and the cares of this world will fall away like chafe on the wind. River | ||
| Asurprise Registered user Username: Asurprise Post Number: 1149 Registered: 7-2007 |
The SDA religion was just a dry religion back when I was an Adventist. Now I don't have a religion - I have a relationship! (Message edited by Asurprise on January 25, 2010) | ||
| Asurprise Registered user Username: Asurprise Post Number: 1150 Registered: 7-2007 |
Another thing that has changed for me is the nearness of God. It's kind of hard to explain, but before, when I was an Adventist; I just had to "believe" He was there listening to my prayers and that He cared. There was no evidence of Him before. | ||
| Asurprise Registered user Username: Asurprise Post Number: 1153 Registered: 7-2007 |
When I was an Adventist, the songs I sang with the congregation in church told of Jesus being close and a personal Friend. I just figured He was and that a person simply had to take that by "faith." Now He really is a close personal Friend and it isn't a metaphor!!! Another change is that the New Testament really makes sense just the way it reads. Adventists have to add things here and there, such as the word "ceremonial," and they add part of the Old Testament and subtract part of the New Testament that Jesus brought in by His death (Hebrews 9:15-17). The sad thing is that I didn't have a clue that was so, when I was an Adventist. I was just certain that I was in the one true church!  |
