Ad Rvw : Something Has Got To Change

[bevin]

http://www.adventistreview.org/2005-1516/story1.html

Quote:

---

I know firsthand the displacement and loneliness of young people frustrated by a church that is no longer relevant to them. I also know the frustration of a mammoth organization that has feared alienating its constituency through change, but is starting to understand it cannot survive unless it does.

---

What a fantastic article - one of the best ever published in the Review.

/Bevin

[Nicodema]

Thanks for calling this one to our attention; it is a great article.

[Nicodema]

"How could I be the church? What did that mean for me? I prayed ardently for answers that night, and in the morning everything was clear: my anger was no longer serving a purpose. Simply put, God wanted me to get over it. If I didn't have solutions, then I didn't have the right to criticize the church. Moreover, if I didn't search for solutions, then I was just as bad as all the people I had blamed for my pain. That day my life purpose changed."

[wicklunds]

Hey thanks for the comment Coaspen. I was wondering what everyone thought about the guys comment about being angry over church standards. It seems like to be angry over church standards is a convenient way of rationalizing your own disobedience. I am not attacking the guy, but I have heard this kind of thing over and over again. Is it the fault of those who have set the bar high as far as standards are concerned, or is it that we have chosen that higher standards are unattainable? Just wondering about what you think. Obviously without Christ in the life, higher standards are a threat to happiness. Personal sinfulness feels threatened by a higher calling of abiding in Jesus.

[Jeannieb43]

But do you mean we have to live a perfect life before we have hope of salvation? If that's true, I'm lost for sure.

"Standards" can't be measured objectively. "Standards" should include a personal, daily, real-time involvement with Bible study, with prayer, with talking to others about what God is doing in our lives; and with total trust in Divine power as we struggle with temptation.

Those standards I agree are basic to our salvation.

But the length of our hemlines, the absence of lipstick or jewelry on our bodies, whether or not we travel by auto or eat in a restaurant on a Sabbath afternoon ... those kinds of "standards" IMHO are not what God requires.

[DaveM1936]

After I graduated from Andrews University in 1961, I began teaching. Being raised an SDA, the "standards" were a part of my very nature. But all through our SDA church school (1-12) I struggled with the standards. I never diagreed with them. I just couldn't live them. Finally, I concluded that there was something wrong with me.

I reasoned that since I was going to be lost, I might as well live it up. No use loosing both worlds. So I would have what I wanted from this one. AS EGW said, I heard only dry sermonds on the law. No one explained "how" one lived the Christian life. I was "in the world" for 15 years. But I never lost faith in the Bible, EGW, or our church doctrines. I would ocassionaly attend the nearest SDA church. I still longed to be back. But I knew I could not perform.

One night, the Spirit finally broke through to me. Since God knew what I believed at the time about the judgment, He made me see myself standing before the judgment throne, condemned. I knew I was going to be lost. I said outloud, "Give me another chance."

I have attended church ever since. But it has taken me years to finally learn the "how". The standard that God expects of us is as high above us as God is above us. We can never reach it. As Jesus told the rich young ruler, If you want to be good, jump over the moon. I tried repeatedly to jump high enough to live up to the standard God had set.

Now I know the how.

l. I am sick with sinfulness. There is no cure for me.

2. I long to be loved and to be important to someone. This is the basic need of everyone. People with rings in noses, ears, lips, eyebrows are only crying out for someone to love and care about them.

3. I will never trust anyone I do not know personally. I need to know that the person is completely trustworthy. This takes time.

4. Forgetting about defects, sins, weaknesses, addictions, I took time to get acquainted with Jesus (God). I stopped working on living up to standards. I stop trying to be good. I stopped working on addictions, insanity (all of us are insane). I stopped reading the bible as a way of being good. I stopped praying about my sins, defects, weaknesses, addictions. Instead, I started thanking God for all He had done for me, about what a wonderful Friend and Companion He is.

5. I worked instead on getting to know Jesus.

I decided that I had no idea who God was. The only thing I wanted to know was just what kind of God I served. I started with the Psalms. No proof texts. I marked every verse that told me something about God. I discovered that He loved Dave with a steadfast love. I discovered that I did not need to worry about my character, my past or present sins. He was forgiveness. He had compassion on me. He understood my struggles. He was my best Friend.

6. Movies were one of my strongest addictions. From a child I would sneak off to watch a movie. I would even steal money from mother's purse so I could go. Instead of staying with her during church, I would sneak out to a movie.

This was a problem all through my life. One day I learned about God boxes. A small metal or plastic card file box. On a sheet of paper I wrote "movies" and put it in the box, closed the lid, and went on with my life watching movies. It was now God's problem.

One day I realized that I had not been to a theater in months. I usually went at least once a week. Then one day I just stopped renting movies. I stopped the cable. All this came as a surprise to me. God had indeed taken care of the problem.

The Christian life is all about relationships. God cares more about how we treat each other than about what we believe. He cares more about whether we want to be His friend than what we believe. I don't mean than doctrines don't matter. Instead I see them now as aspects of the character of Christ and how I relate to Him.

Your friend,

Dave M

[wicklunds]

Quote:

---

5. I worked instead on getting to know Jesus.

---

Dave, I read your post and I can definitely understand your struggles. We all could. But when I came to this part of your post I couldnt help but pause and think. This is exactly the mentality that were are tripping ourselves up with. Our problem is not in wanting to do good. The road to hell is paved with good intentions as they say. But this sweet #5 is all I needed to understand your pains.

The way I see it is that you were concentrating on being good in and of yourself before, and now you are concentrating on letting Jesus take care of your flaws and heavenly incompatibilities. The only problem I see is that you are still actively doing something, just not concentrating on following rules according to your own strength. That is exactly what it means to be a co-laborer with God.

One thing I would recommend you try doing though, and that is to stop emasculating standards and heavenly rules(commandments) from the work of Jesus Christ. We who are heaven-bound will not see the law of God (set of rules) as an unjust set of rules, but a law of liberty that God has stated for our protection. The law is holy, and just, and good, just as it is written. Please do not fall for the antinomian, new theology that has pervaded our ranks at a fever pitch. It will get us on the highway to Sunday in a big hurry. I have seen it happening in celebration type churches over and over. Lets learn from their mistakes so we won't find ourselves wishing we would have listened to Ellen White in the end of all things.

Thanks for your post.

In Christ,

Dennis

[Guest]

Something has to change???

Really? Do you agree with this??

I thought suggesting this was being critical and tearing down the church...

How dare they print that article...it will open up Pandora's box and the floodgates of criticism wil follow suit.

I can see the copycats now....some will even come out of the woodwork...protesting NFDMTTS.

Some wil even dare to mention the R word....

[DaveM1936]

Quote:

---

One thing I would recommend you try doing though, and that is to stop emasculating standards and heavenly rules(commandments) from the work of Jesus Christ. We who are heaven-bound will not see the law of God (set of rules) as an unjust set of rules, but a law of liberty that God has stated for our protection. The law is holy, and just, and good, just as it is written. Please do not fall for the antinomian, new theology that has pervaded our ranks at a fever pitch. It will get us on the highway to Sunday in a big hurry. I have seen it happening in celebration type churches over and over. Lets learn from their mistakes so we won't find ourselves wishing we would have listened to Ellen White in the end of all things.

---

If I came across as doing away with the law, I apoligize. I was focused on my behavior. Now I see that "living it up" is just the other side of the same coin. I never saw anything wrong with the law. If people lived by it our relationship problems would cease. My problem was that I knew I couldn't live it.

Now I have come to see that God equals the law. The law has come to mean to me more than a set of rules. It tells us how God treats others, how He runs His universe. In the gospels, Christ lived out the law in a way we could understand. When I saw this, my outlook changed. But my ability to be like Christ still remained impossible.

The desire was there. But now I knew that I could not love and treat others the way Christ did. I learned that Christ was willing to live out this life in me. Let me show you have this works.

I already told about my experience with movies. This was a big addiction. I knew I was feeding my mind with unhealthy food. I just stopped working on stopping. Suddenly the victory came as a gift.

I was also a chocolate addict. Over the three candy holidays, I had stocked up during the after holiday sales. I knew I should not eat candy. But I found myself eating more and more. Being a borderline diabetic, this was not good. One day I went to the cupboard to get some. At that instant, I shut the door. I had not worked on stopping. It just came as a complete surprise to me.

I had read recently that we should not put pickles or pickle products in our stomach. Even thought I am a vegetarian, I always put large amounts of catsup and relish on my vegertarian burger. One day, as a complete surprise, I just took two slices of bread, put the burger on it without any catsup or relish.

This is how law keeping works. I spent some time each day reading in the gospels, sharing what I learned and watching 3abn in the evening. To me, victory over anyting always comes as a surprise.

Dependence on Christ, focusing on Christ does not do away with the need to treat others like God treats me. But it changes me unconsciously. A law of life is: we become like what we behold. I decided to behold the One whom I wanted to be like.

Your friend,

Dave M