Doctrine, Simplicity and Application
So I have been in Santa Cruz the past three days visiting my girlfriend, Lidia. We are having a great time, but also have had a lot of emotion in the last couple days, which I think is a result of us sharing so much so fast and wearing ourselves out. You can be in prayer for us as we seek God's will and wait for HIS timing, not ours.
Lidia and I were talking yesterday about our faiths, something that we had previously not done and we come from different denominations (she's evangelical and I'm Presbyterian). The subject of baptism came up when I was talking with her dad on Saturday and yesterday she and I talked about it. Our two churches have different views on baptism, specifically infant baptism. My church baptizes infants and hers does not, it is something strictly done after accepting the Lord. The evangelicals follow Jesus's example and believe it's not appropriate to baptize until one has accepted the Lord in faith, that it is important to profess commitment to God in front of the church and in most churches a prerequisite for taking communion. So, for me to say that I was baptized as an infant raised a huge red flag between us. As I explained my interpretation of the Presbyterian doctrine, she started telling me about her experiences in YWAM.
One of the things she said to me that she liked about her experiences in YWAM was that she was learning theory and getting to put it into practice at the same time. Her denomination is very simple and very literal in their interpretation of the Bible and it got me to thinking, do we as Christians in denominations sometimes overthink doctrine and "miss the forest for the trees" and try to complicate things that really shouldn't be difficult to understand? She suggested to me that I consider studying the Bible in a YWAM school where they have a non-doctrinal approach to study so as to have a non-biased view of the Bible (or at least as much as possible) and then if I still wanted to, to attend seminary. So, that has been on my mind and I am praying about what the Lord's will is for me. She mentioned to me that there were YWAM schools in the States where she thought we could both go and she could learn English while I do the study. It's something I am beginning to think about since I definitely want to be a "Christian first" as my friend Chris once said and "Presbyterian second".
Lidia and I were talking yesterday about our faiths, something that we had previously not done and we come from different denominations (she's evangelical and I'm Presbyterian). The subject of baptism came up when I was talking with her dad on Saturday and yesterday she and I talked about it. Our two churches have different views on baptism, specifically infant baptism. My church baptizes infants and hers does not, it is something strictly done after accepting the Lord. The evangelicals follow Jesus's example and believe it's not appropriate to baptize until one has accepted the Lord in faith, that it is important to profess commitment to God in front of the church and in most churches a prerequisite for taking communion. So, for me to say that I was baptized as an infant raised a huge red flag between us. As I explained my interpretation of the Presbyterian doctrine, she started telling me about her experiences in YWAM.
One of the things she said to me that she liked about her experiences in YWAM was that she was learning theory and getting to put it into practice at the same time. Her denomination is very simple and very literal in their interpretation of the Bible and it got me to thinking, do we as Christians in denominations sometimes overthink doctrine and "miss the forest for the trees" and try to complicate things that really shouldn't be difficult to understand? She suggested to me that I consider studying the Bible in a YWAM school where they have a non-doctrinal approach to study so as to have a non-biased view of the Bible (or at least as much as possible) and then if I still wanted to, to attend seminary. So, that has been on my mind and I am praying about what the Lord's will is for me. She mentioned to me that there were YWAM schools in the States where she thought we could both go and she could learn English while I do the study. It's something I am beginning to think about since I definitely want to be a "Christian first" as my friend Chris once said and "Presbyterian second".
posted by Jimmy Bollinger at
4:13 PM
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