Forgive my ignorance a bit, I haven't ever been to a Christian church before just Mormon is quite different. Don't you have to be baptized in order to receive the gift of the holy spirit and then therefore be born again?
How to get baptized? In the UK
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Yeah you have to pay 10% of your income as tithing, its mandatory once baptized in and well it goes towards things I don't agree with to be honest
That answer varies from denomination to denomination. Same with most answers.
"Mandatory" doesn't capture the full picture for LDS Christians. If an LDS Christian struggling with finances, tithing can be waived, or "hey you pay $100, and we'll pay $100 of your rent", as well as just subsidizing things. Such are worked out by chatting with one's LDS Christian bishop. There's no desire to make anyone broke, the aim is also to simply not have money be your god. Also, they have free financial management classes for absolutely everyone.
All my life till I was 35 I thought I was a Christian, then the vicar from the local Anglican church gave me a booklet called 'Journey Into Life'. which very clearly told me I was not. Just going to church, or reading the bible, or being a child of Christian parent and even believing in God wasn't enough. I had to make a decision to ask God to forgive me and turn away from sin - repent. Also I needed to ask Jesus into my life which I did, From that very moment I was born again and the Holy Spirit came to live in me. Later I had hands laid on me to receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit and began singing in tongues. And after a few years God told me to be baptised so I had to leave the Anglican church and join a non denominational fellowship where I still am today. Here is a link to it. Welcome - CHURCH@Claremont
Nobody is 'ordained' just as non of the early Christians were 'ordained' but but we are all part of that Royal Priesthood, in fact our pastor and his wife own a pet shop.
1 Peter 2:9
But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.
Our vision was to follow the example of the early church as described in Acts. No vestment, no candles, no titles. Nobody more important than anyone else. Not religion but relationship.
"They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe at the many wonders and signs performed by the apostles. All the believers were together and had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favour of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved."
Acts 2:42-47
But do you want to join a Christian fellowship/church or just get baptised? Are you born again? @jessicaleks93
GRACE ambassador
Well-Known Member
Precious friend, no problem at all. Today, Under God's Pure Grace, there is
only One [ Spiritual ] Baptism. Thus there is no need to be confused about water.
I will pray for you and your increasing knowledge about God's Word Of Truth, Rightly
Divided.
Amen.
Aunty Jane
Well-Known Member
Absolute hogwash....why on earth would you need to lie to justify your church’s greed?
Christians are not under obligation to tithe.....fact.
Seek out the church of Christ
Aunty Jane
Well-Known Member
You know Jessica, that’s the whole crux of the problem.....being a Christian is not about denomination....it’s about a relationship with God through the one he sent to earth to teach us God’s truth and to lay down his life for us....Jesus Christ. We have to really know both of them. (John 17:3) This Jesus said, lays the foundation of our salvation.
Since there is only one truth, it is up to us to find those who teach it....there is only one brotherhood of Christians who are promoting this truth, and we have to go back to the beginning of Christianity to find out what the first Christians believed and practiced, as taught by Jesus himself, and passed on through the work of his apostles. When you compare that first century model with what today, masquerades as “Christianity”.....there is no resemblance.
Make a checklist.....
1) Did the first Christians believe that God was “three”...or “one”? Since all the first Christians were Jewish, they recited the Shema on a regular basis. (Deut 6:4) Their God (Yahweh/Jehovah) was “one”.
Only pagans believed in multiple gods.
2) Did the first Christians believe in immortality of the soul? NO! They believed in resurrection of the dead, which is a return to life, not a continuation of it somewhere else.
When Jesus raised his friend Lazarus, he did not pluck him from heaven back to this life only to die again later from some other cause. What would have been the point? Where did Jesus say he was? He said he was “sleeping”. And when Jesus got there to awaken him, his sister, Martha declared her belief in the future “resurrection on the last day”. (John 11:11-14, 22-23)
3) Did Jesus ever teach that there was a hell of eternal torment for the wicked? No! Again, since there was no part of man that kept living after death, there could be no conscious torment either. You have to be alive to feel pain or to suffer. What law of God ever involved torture? There were two kinds of sin under God’s law.....capital offences which merited the death penalty, and the lesser offences which carried penalties involving compensation to a victim. All very just and always with room for repentance. We have as an example the thief who died alongside Jesus. Even though his crime was a capital offence, he died knowing that Jesus had promised him a resurrection. He would “be with Jesus in paradise”.....but not heaven. It is important to know the difference. (Luke 23:39-43)
The future resurrection of the dead was what Jews believed in, and Jesus never altered that.....it is what their Scripture taught. The dead would “sleep” in their graves in an unconscious state until it was time for the resurrection to take place....under the established rulership of God’s Kingdom. (Eccl 9:5, 10; John 5:28-29)
Just with those three doctrinal issues that unite Christendom, we see a complete departure from what Jesus taught.
This is what Bible study reveals.....not a study of theology, which is Christendom’s teachings dished out to the masses as truth, when it is no such thing.
Study the Bible and God’s spirit will direct you to HIS truth, not man’s.
Please feel free to ask questions.....you might be surprised at the Bible’s answers.
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Hello. Just to supplement my previous reply to you regarding the church of Christ in the Uk.
I see by a lot of the other postings and your questions that your perception of the church and Christianity is based on a view predicated upon the large institutional religious organizations you're obviously familiar with and most likely are dominant on your region of the globe. Unfortunately, these do not adhere to sound scriptural doctrine and are highly influenced by man and tradition with hierarchical structures thar govern them.
The church of the bible is NOT like them nor they like it.
The church if the bible, which we should all aspire to, is quite simple. Each congregation was self sufficient reporting to no one nor taking direction from anyone. The church simply has it's members, the preacher, decons, and elders, with the elders, also known as bishops, being responsible for and guiding the local body of Christ, the church.
You become a member of the body of Christ (his church), by being baptized into it, thereby becoming a Christian and child of God as well as saved from your sins. I suggest you read all of the book of Acts, and focus on Acts 2:38-47.
Also read the book of Titus, and 1 Tim to get an idea of the simple structure of the church.
I see by a lot of the other postings and your questions that your perception of the church and Christianity is based on a view predicated upon the large institutional religious organizations you're obviously familiar with and most likely are dominant on your region of the globe. Unfortunately, these do not adhere to sound scriptural doctrine and are highly influenced by man and tradition with hierarchical structures thar govern them.
The church of the bible is NOT like them nor they like it.
The church if the bible, which we should all aspire to, is quite simple. Each congregation was self sufficient reporting to no one nor taking direction from anyone. The church simply has it's members, the preacher, decons, and elders, with the elders, also known as bishops, being responsible for and guiding the local body of Christ, the church.
You become a member of the body of Christ (his church), by being baptized into it, thereby becoming a Christian and child of God as well as saved from your sins. I suggest you read all of the book of Acts, and focus on Acts 2:38-47.
Also read the book of Titus, and 1 Tim to get an idea of the simple structure of the church.
Bob Carabbio
Well-Known Member
Why Bother?? the immersion ceremony in and of itself MEANS NOTHING.
Salvation is BY FAITH in the SIN OFFERING made by Jesus on Calvary. when you're convicted of you SIN by the Holy SPirit, then you can REPENT, and call on GOd for salvation. THEN, AS a Christian, it's time to be baptized.
Agreed; it means nothing unless we are born again but the bible tells us to do it.
Acts 22:16
And now what are you waiting for? Get up, be baptised
Aunty Jane
Well-Known Member
The whole 22nd chapter of Acts is an amazing story of Saul’s conversion and the reason why the Jews began to hate him. As the foremost enemy of the Christian Faith, he was the most infamous of their persecutors.....their champion.
But he relates to his Jewish brothers what happened to him on the road to Damascus, where he was to round up more Christians and bring them back to Jerusalem for public punishment.....a miraculous event that changed the course of his entire life. No one could question Saul’s zeal for his God as he demonstrated with his severe mistreatment of Christ’s followers. The Jews had hoped that the execution of their leader would silence this group, but they just continued to increase in numbers despite the persecution.
God saw that this man’s zeal was misdirected, and chose him, a man so very different to the 12 who were uneducated men, to send him to the Gentiles.....he was quite at home with the Greek philosophers and others due to his education and status as a Pharisee....he was a Roman citizen, which gave him rights that others did not have, and he was used extensively by his Lord Jesus to bring good news to the nations as well as to his Jewish brothers who had not been hoodwinked by the Pharisees, such as the Beroeans.
A faithful Jewish Christian named Ananias’ was instructed to restore sight to the blinded Saul and to give him instructions...
“He said: ‘The God of our forefathers has chosen you to come to know his will and to see the righteous one and to hear the voice of his mouth, 15 because you are to be a witness for him to all men of the things you have seen and heard. 16 And now why are you delaying? Rise, get baptized, and wash your sins away by your calling on his name.’” (Acts 22:14-16)
So with his baptism, Saul became the apostle Paul, a zealous witness for Jesus, and servant of his God Yahweh in a completely different capacity. He was used by God to pen a great deal of our Christian Scripture, and proved to be a real asset to the Christian Faith, which is why God chose him.
To use his baptism as a model for others is not really accurate. For the majority of the first Christians, baptism was firstly as a symbol of repentance over breaches of God’s law....this was in preparation for the Jews to receive Jesus as Messiah, as John was sent to “prepare the way” for his ministry. Now in a repentant state, they were ready to hear his powerful discourses and if their heart inclined them, they would become his disciples by being baptised again “in Jesus’s name”. John’s baptism was in preparation for what was to come.
Later, Christian baptism did not require John’s baptism.....he was actually executed by Herod before Jesus died.
So, Christian baptism back then, followed hearing the Christian message and being taught about the Christ and then being baptized publicly as a disciple of Jesus, dedicating their life to following Christ’s teachings.
Jesus’ instructions to his disciples shows what took place....
Matt 10:11-15...
“Into whatever city or village you enter, search out who in it is deserving, and stay there until you leave. 12 When you enter the house, greet the household. 13 If the house is deserving, let the peace you wish it come upon it; but if it is not deserving, let the peace from you return upon you. 14 Wherever anyone does not receive you or listen to your words, on going out of that house or that city, shake the dust off your feet. 15 Truly I say to you, it will be more endurable for the land of Sodʹom and Go·morʹrah on Judgment Day than for that city.”
The ministry assigned to Christ’s disciples meant visiting people in their homes and imparting the message to them. Those who responded were granted peace, but to those who did not respond, the peace was to return to the messengers, who then “shook the dust off their feet” in symbol of God’s rejection of them....it would be “more endurable for Sodom and Gomorrah” on judgment day, than for those ones.
In Saul’s case, God chose him, he did not choose God....so therefore his conversion is not the norm.
As an apostle, he was not taught by the other apostles, but by the resurrected Jesus himself. Only after that period of education did he join the other apostles in their assigned ministry.
There is always a story behind any quotation of scripture....we have to make sure that we know where it fits in the big picture so that we don’t give people a false impression.
Being “born again” means different things to different people......how can that be?
What does it mean to you?
Being born again happens at the same exact time that you become a child of God, a Christian, and that happens when you're baptized into the body of Christ, the church, and your sins are removed. It all happens at the same time which is obvious when all scriptures are considered.
Aunty Jane
Well-Known Member
Scripture please...everyone has their version of what it means....so what does the Bible say?
That’s one of the points I made at our “Christian Ministry” meeting a couple weeks ago. Except I said “misguided”.
You know, we all understand that most of the Pharisees were ‘position-seeking’ guys, more interested in show.
But Paul was a Pharisee because of his love for Jehovah… and he loved people. He wanted to help his fellow Jewish brothers … in stark contrast to the majority, apparently … and Jehovah noticed that.
Sorry, I don’t want to derail the thread.
Act 2:38 And Peter said to them, "Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Believing, repenting and being baptized in the name of Jesus Christ unto the forgiveness of sins and receiving the gift (indwelling) of the Holy Spirit is being born again.
Rom 6:3 Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?
Rom 6:4 We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.
Walking in the newness of life is being born again.
Gal 3:25 But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian,
Gal 3:26 for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith.
Gal 3:27 For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ.
Putting on Christ is being born again.
Col 2:11 In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ,
Col 2:12 having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead.
Col 2:13 And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses,
Being dead in trespasses and then being made alive together with Christ is being born again.
It is in baptism that one is born of water and Spirit. Born again is the rebirth of the spirit. That which was initially born of the spirit, then became dead in trespasses and sins is then born again through believing, repenting and being baptized in the name of Jesus Christ unto the forgiveness of sin and the receiving of the gift (indwelling) of the Holy Spirit.
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