I remember a long time ago, I was having a discussion about non-denominational churches with someone. Maybe it was Jon! It was pretty far in the past. During this discussion, I remember saying (or maybe just thinking) that these "new" churches were sort of suspicious. Religion definitely evolves over time, but I believe then and now in an absolute truth. So for all these groups to be diverging and making their own doctrinal paths seemed pretty foolish to me.

I thought, "The Church has 2000 years (even more if you count the Israelite heritage) of thought and philosophy riding behind it. Why would people abandon that to try to figure it out on their own?" I was raised in a Reformed Presbyterian church, so I don't know what "Church" I was even referring to. It was pretty foolish.

I didn't actually care about denominations that much, though. I liked the church I was with, and I sort of had a bad image of Catholicism in my mind, but other than that I didn't know what the big deal was. So when I got to college I was more than happy to go to whatever church was nearby, even if it was "non-denom."

HA! That looks like demon. Not really a good truncation.

So I went to this church for a while, and it was alright, but after a semester or so I started to get restless. I NEVER made any friends there. I went with my roommate and maybe a few girls I knew, and we'd leave again afterwards without ever being spoken to or met. I knew a few things about church:

It's something you're a PART of, not something you attend.
Lessons and lifestyles should be based on the Bible, not personal philosophies.
Worship is great but I'm not there to get emotional, so there'd better be more than good worship.
It should be challenging on a personal level, but I should feel loved and welcome.
And other such things.

So I quit going. I was looking for something more, and boy did I find it. I stumbled into a group of guys and girls who did all of the things I mentioned above, and more. They studied the Bible with me, showed me that my faith and my life didn't match Scripture, helped me repent and get right with God, and became my best friends. It was literally life-changing.

And the church I became a part of is non-denominational. Well, sort of. There are a lot of sister churches, where we've branched out and planted ministries all over the world. But the main thing is that we don't care about denominations. There's one Church, and you're either in it or you aren't. Having separate groups based on doctrine seriously undermines the point of the church (as does, of course, having wrong doctrine.) Doctrine is important, and we shouldn't be learning solely from our historical philosophies and stuff like that. We should be learning from the Bible. Period. And if we don't agree on major stuff, then somebody isn't being humble to Scripture.

That's one thing that I've learned. As a religion, Christianity has a rich history (both good and bad) of culture, philosophy, etc. But what good is philosophy by itself? How does a refined culture help me, a sinner? It doesn't. If I don't have a personal relationship with God, my religion is worthless. If I don't abide in the Word, how can he abide in me?

And what's more, that religious history has led us astray. Read the New Testament. Check out what the disciples do after Jesus dies. The first century church was a RADICAL movement. Read those scriptures and then think: have you been to a church that even remotely resembles that heart? There's a big argument these days about the meaning and usefulness of baptism. Go read about baptism in the New Testament. And then read about its history in the church since then. It was only recently that people started "praying Jesus into their hearts." How does that happen? Why do we replace the Law of God with something man-made?

Mark 7:5 --
5 So the Pharisees and teachers of the law asked Jesus, �Why don�t your disciples live according to the tradition of the elders instead of eating their food with defiled hands?�

6 He replied, �Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites; as it is written:

��These people honor me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
7 They worship me in vain;
their teachings are merely human rules.�
8 You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to human traditions.�

9 And he continued, �You have a fine way of setting aside the commands of God in order to observe your own traditions! 10 For Moses said, �Honor your father and mother,� and, �Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death.� 11 But you say that if anyone declares that what might have been used to help their father or mother is Corban (that is, devoted to God)� 12 then you no longer let them do anything for their father or mother. 13 Thus you nullify the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down. And you do many things like that.�

Just something I was thinking about today. It's pretty badly put together, I didn't try to reign in the rambling. Thanks for reading.

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Check me out in the front.

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Between my need to be as awesome as possible and the unfulfilled potential that comes with having a naturally athletic body (ladies!), I've always had an interest in parkour. My idea was to try to get into some sort of club when I started school at Tech, but that didn't work out too well, so I sort of put it aside. But now after reading Zanzibar 's inspiring post I've decided to try to get into it again. So we'll see how that goes.

Rush is over. It was nuts! Met some really cool guys, hopefully I'll be seeing more of them in the future.

Had my first Bible study of the semester with my good buddy. Looking forward to an awesome semester in that regard.

Got my physics book in the mail yesterday, just in time to finish this first homework assignment over the weekend. Except...it's the wrong edition. Looking forward to a good semester though, because HEY I'm trying to do the homework that's progress.

TTYL guys.

EDIT 1/25/2012

I love this song so much.

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All sorts of fun stuff going on in my life right now. Some of it is literal fun, some of it is other kinds of awesome, and some is really just deeply upsetting. But man, it's all distracting. Meanwhile I can barely keep my eyes open (I slept SO well last night! What gives?) and I have a test and possibly also a quiz tomorrow to study for.

The Super Bowl was pretty disappointing when it came to commercials. Very good game, though! I didn't care, and I was still pretty entranced by the end. But now I'm covered in lint from this guy's carpet.

Nothing is working out the way I wanted. Again, this is a mixed bag; some of the things I wanted weren't so great, so I'm grateful that I'm being vetoed. Very grateful. But other aspects of my life that were supposed to be SO simple have turned into complete garbage and I cannot get any slack.

Oh well. The moon looked nice. I'm off to tackle this again. 'til next time.

EDIT:
Also, lol what's Valentine's Day

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