Tuesday, August 16, 2005 |
The thing is that I am just becoming extremely annoyed at the way Christians are going about things in today's age. Here is some things that I want to tell you about me. First of all... back in 1995 I was given the name "BibleBoy" by people bashing me in school. They called me that to be detrimental to me.... but in reality, I realized that that is who I was.... and as a result, I changed my online handles to "BibleBoy" from "Headpin" that I used to use. This was long before people were using the internet... back when we used BBS systems as a form of online communication. As the internet grew popular, I migrated to the net.... in 1998 I registered bibleboy.org (it shows 2000 now because of record updates) and it has been my domain since then. In the past few years I have been noting others with the name "BibleBoy" ... There is you, and I have also found online someone else using that name. I knew that "BibleBoy" was too much of a "straight" name so I mixed it in with my favorite number and dropped the vowels making it like a true internet handle.... that is where I became bblboy54. I have had a Google Alert set up for "bibleboy" for quite some time so that I could monitor anyone mentioning me on the web... as a result I have been watching your posts for a long time and what I noticed most of all is that you are exactly how I used to be. The things that you say here are exactly the things that I said back in the BBS days -- the exact same things that got me in trouble and got me kicked off of some systems. People had no respect for me which I wrote off to be a result of my following Christ ... in the long run, yes, this was the reason.... but the fact is that I greatly misunderstood my purpose and I was greatly uneffective in not only my walk with God but with showing others what God is all about. All I was doing was confirming everyone's already exsisting theory that Christians are nut cases. Towards the end of 1999 I had a drastic eye opening experience. I moved to FL to work for Disney World..... 90% of my co-workers were homosexual. It took alot of adjusting for me. A few months later I was transfered to Epcot Center from MGM Studios and I went through traning. In training I started talking to a very nice guy who always wore Christian T-Shirts and talked very fondly of the Lord. Much to my surprise a few weeks later I found out he was also a homosexual. I dealt with this for a while.... really asking God what I was to make of this and God really impressed on me that this man struggles with sin the same way that I struggle with sin. It became very clear that the sturggles I have people write off as normal struggles so I am allowed to still be called a Christian.... but so many Christians can not accept homosexuality so these people are automatically not able to be Christians..... and its this thinking that is starting to really destroy people. This man sinned...... As did I.... I'm by far not a homosexual.... but why is it that I could have a sexual problem with a girl and be reprimanded for the action but not be attacked and said that I cant be a Christian but this man has the same type of a sexual problem with a man and automatically he can not be a Christian.... and one step more -- he is restricted from attending certain churches. The typical Christian of today will never be able to reach that man. Today I live in Virginia and 2 of my best friends here are homosexuals. Both of them know that I do not support homosexuality in any way... but both of them know that I respect them as people. My one friend told me one day that there were 2 things he hated more than anything in the world.... those were Christians and Republicans. My response was "umm.. I'm both" and he said "yes, but your different" .... and that was the best that I ever felt about myself.... and in the past few months I have been able to make such an impact on him. Yes, he is still gay.... and no, he may never come around to where he should be -- but that's not my job. I have realized that we CAN NOT bring people to the Lord. Only God can do that.... we must plant the seeds and then let God do His work. The more we paint ourselves to be complete nutcases, the less effective we can be. God said in Isaiah "See, I am doing a new thing" ... God doesnt change but sometimes the things He does do change. I think it's time for Christians to realize that He is doing a new thing. It is more important that we befriend these people that go completely against our beliefs. Some will never listen and those are the people that we walk away from. Those are the people Jesus shook the dust off of His sandals and walked away from. But the people that He reached He befriended. There were the people that He spoke against.... He overturned the tables in the temple.... but look at the majority of the people He reached. The prostitue that was about to get stoned.... Jesus walked up and stood up for her and said "He that is without sin, throw the first stone"... The woman at the well.... He befriended her.... Look at Zachias.... Jesus went to His house.... all of these people He reached by not condeming them but by befriending them. As Christians, it is our job to model Jesus. Many Christians where bracelets that say WWJD for What Would Jesus Do ... but I think that it should be WDJD for What DID Jesus Do. Its much more effective to look at Jesus' life and model it than it is to speculate what He would do if He was standing in each position. If you consume yourself with His life, then you'll be able to walk right through situations without even having to think about it. It turns my stomach to see constant arguments between someone who blatantly says they are a Christian and someone who is not a Christian. There is no point. In an argument, that non-Christian is only going to be defensive and the Christian is only going to prove the belief that the non-Christian already has that God is not Love.... because quite honestly, that is EXACTLY how I would view it in their shoes. For a short time I started a group of about 6 people who went onto IRC to do "street witnessing" but not in the traditional sense. What we did was met in one channel and then randomly picked another secular channel. All 6 of us would go in there and join in their conversation.... we would talk about whatever they were talking about..... and if the right moment came up to slip God into the conversation, we would do it.... but only at that moment. I remember one time we did this..... We led someone to the Lord and also brought someone back into Chrstitianity that had turned his back on God. The reason? He told us that we showed him that Christianity isnt all about the turn-or-burn preaching that pushed him so far away. That should speak to any Christian. Not only do we see someone coming to the Lord because of love.... but we also see someone who WAS a Christian and was pushed away because of people cramming stuff down his throat. If someone who *IS* a Christian is pushed away because of that, how are we even going to being to reach non-Christians with that approach. I am not a perfect person.... in fact, I wake up every day misserable because of things that I struggle with.... but then God speaks to me and performs yet another miracle in my life.... and often times I sit crying because I cant understand how God could minister to me with being the horrible person that I am. I am nowhere near worthy of doing God's work.... but somehow, He uses me anyway. I will never be worthy of being used by God.... but I guess He'll use me anyway. I dont want anyone to be like me... it's the last thing I want because I really, truly, am not a good person. What I want to see is Christians start befriending those sinners that are out there and start modeling the Life of Christ. I want Christians to start sitting back and thinking about Jesus calling Zachias down from the tree.... and thinking about Jesus stopping the people from stoning the girl who had every right to be stoned. Until we, as Christians, start modeling this behavior, the world has every right not to believe.... why would they? Unless we model Jesus's constant behavior of standing up for the sinners then we truly are nothing but hippocritical. God Bless you, brother! Bob (C)2003-2008, Bob K Mertz - Some Rights Reserved |
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Bob, you have me in tears. The reason I left the church and God was because I was told I was not a christian because I'm gay. There is one person in my life besides you that has told me what you have written, it's funny because this person has the same b-day as you, weird huh? Homosexuall's have it the worst in the church. We didn't make a choice to be attracted to other men and to break that habbit it drives most over the edge and others just walk away from God. Thank you for being a good witness to Christ, you have given me hope and knowing there are probably others that feel the same way gives me a reason to return to God and the church.
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