River of Life Christian Fellowships (ROLCF) are all over the country and are a part of a sect (for lack of a better term) that are known as "Charismatic" Churches. Now I left that church to join another one. Why? I left because of the Charismatic stuff.
Now, I have been to two Charismatic Churches: The church mentioned above and a Pentecostal Church in the same town. I left them both for a couple of reasons. Now, I knew nothing of the Pentecostal movement before I went to them but I left without diving deeper either because I knew something wasn't right.
The reason why I left the first one was because I was 100% uncomfortable being there. That and an average service was 3 hours long! People shouting after receiving communion, and just lying on the floor and stuff was just caused me to back away. I would later find out that it was for a good reason.
You know why I love the Word of God? It is because God used it to save my life during the year of suicidal attempts, and because I understood what the foundation of my faith was.
When I went to the Pentecostal Church, it was just to go to their youth group. At first it was focused on the Word of God and I learned a great deal of it in Grade 10. Even the Dream Convention they went to every year in TO was biblical. However, I noticed that the people were doing the exact same thing that the people at ROLCF were doing. At first I went with the flow. Then along comes grade 11.
So, during worship I started to raise my arms (which was extremely painful). I went up to the front and got my head touched. I went to the Dream Conference and everything...However, nothing happened. No falling down, speaking in tongues, no nothing. That and that concert seemed to focus on only one thing: charismatic gifts, not the Bible... Another thing was that speaker did do a good job of getting everyone all rallied up. Q: "What's the problem with getting a crowd rallied up?" A: "It'll believe everything you say".
He also told "Wow" stories, like reading from a newspaper that had an ad for human body parts and a heart wrenching story about abortion. Don't get me wrong, I am very pro-life. However, these stories sounded to awful and emotional to be true. And worse, it showed how gullible I was! Worse, all I could care about was doing something else other than seeing my Mom on Mother's Day (which was the day I got back)!Luckily, my Mom brought me to my senses.
Then along came my brother Ed, who also also has a blog site, and I discussed it with him. You know what he said? That sort of thing comes and goes. However, the Word of God has stood the test of time.
I thought a lot about what he said and about that Convention. I realized that he was right. Things at youth group just went down hill,because of teh change in leadership and stuff but my love for God's Word grew stronger. That and that Convention pretty much killed my best friend's faith because nothing happened to her either!!
I left that youth group in grade 12 and divorced myself from the youth group scene all together. It was not jsut the charismatic stuff. I also did not like the other places where the youth were mostly just there to socialize and were not really interested in the biblical part of it at all. Was I annoyed? Oh Yeah!!! Makes me so glad that Bible College and post-secondary Christians in general are actually serious about their faith and do not just take it for granted!!
However to all of my Christian readers out there: Trust in the BIBLE!!!!!! Jesus said that God's Word, that was spoken by the Word (Jesus, c John 1:1), will never pass away. Bring everything under Scripture. If it is not in there, or it contradicts the Bible, then through whatever it is out!!
Part II will be written tomorrow.
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