Glad to hear it.
Ah, but see, this is where I think you are missing it. Everyone has their own perspectives and approaches, and there's nothing wrong with healthy skepticism in many matters. But this is where I believe discernment needs to enter in. If you notice, no one was really welcoming Coates all that much in his thread. It was not all outright rejection, but no one truly welcomed him with open arms until I started posting encouraging things to him about what he was sharing. Then you saw him light up and start sharing his life, and feeling like he was among brethren. He's a good guy. See, for me, erring on the side of caution means trying to receive somebody welcomingly even when its looks really bad, and Lord knows we get some fruitcakes coming through here. But I just figure if there's something seriously wrong with the individual, the truth will reveal itself eventually. But if they were actually ok and I assumed they were not and gave them a hard time, I could have it on my hands before God that I didn't welcome them like a brother but assumed the worst unnecessarily.
Again, I understand that we all have our own perspectives and methods, but I have a good friend who doesn't trust her own kin half the time for heaven sakes, LoL, and it doesn't rub people the right way. Quite frankly, with me it just ticks me off, because I'm brutally honest with people, and I expect to be trusted or I wouldn't be going to the effort to be so honest to begin with.
Anyway, I understand it, but I don't really agree with it. If the church had not been willing to see the good in the apostle Paul and give him the benefit of the doubt, where would we be today?
But to each his own, I suppose.