Hello,
My name is Ruth and I am from England.
I don't really where to start this - I grew up in a non-christian household. I think my first notion that there was a God came from school - I remember we read the 10 commandments (for some reason they wanted us to list them in order of importance?
) so I kind of believed there was a God and I would pray and read my NIV new testament and psalms, which I also got from school.
I was also of the belief that you had to be good in order to go to Heaven. I started attending the local village church with my grandmother, but it was more of a social club than a church. Judging by fruit, my grandmother still isn't saved.
When I got older I went to university, and was introduced to 'the world'. I feel grieved to post this: I wasn't a party-going type, but I was becoming increasingly nihilistic: I hated the world; I hated people - I would lie to them just to get them away from me. I felt like an outcast, so I behaved like one. I gravitated to anything perverse, sardonic, or cult-like in terms of entertainment. I prided myself on my knowledge though I was a fool. I had suicidal thoughts, depression, body image problems. I dabbled in the occult, I believed I'd be better off being a man because I never really got on with women, and the majority of my time was spent acting out fantasies that were inside my head.
So I was bit of a mess. But I believe Iwas born-again about two years ago:
Due to my spiralling fantasy life, screenplay writing had become a bit of a hobby, although the things Iwas writing did not glorify God at all. But it gave me an excuse to 'research' topics that today it would be best to sanctify ourselves from. It was during one of these times researching that I came across a sermon online. I can't remember the full message but the man preaching against the sinful pasttimes that people indulge in, like going to the theatre, etc, and was asking what would happen if Jesus came back, and found you doing these things?
I then started to think about al the sin I had committed, how evil I was in my heart, and how much these things had grieved God. I was condemmned to hell and rightfully so. And Jesus died for me because of this. I didn't say a magic prayer or anything; I just remember being on my knees and crying a lot and wanting to say sorry to God over and over. I didn't feel happy, or peaceful or speak in tongues or have intense visions. I just felt broken. I felt like this for some time. I would think about Jesus's death on the cross and I would start crying again.
My family didn't take my belief in the gospel well. I was told I should see 'someone' (ie: a doctor); 'this person isn't my daughter', and I would recieve e-mails from my siblings suggesting that I had this or that diagnosis, or sometimes things like 'if you keep this {expletive} up you'll die alone'. (They're not so angry now I've left home, but they still haven't repented. Please pray for them).
I didn't really know where to turn so I went online, and to cut a long story short, got mixed up in many, many, many false doctrines that tested my faith and led me into a lot of confusion. But God is faithful.
The reason I have ended up here, I believe, is due to an answered prayer. I'd recently left a 'New Testament Church of God' over the doctrine they were teaching and some of the questionable practices they were doing. I was praying to find somewhere where people take God's word seriously, and I stumbled across some of the creation liberty teachings online.
I'm thankful to God for leading me here; I have much to learn and sanctify myself from, and the teachings here have helped me to learn the roots of things that have become common practice in churchianity. I really did benefit from the concordance/lexicon teaching as well - I used to rely on those heavilly to find out 'what the Greek says'...
Thank you for taking the time to read this post; it's got quite long, so I appreciate it.
Lord willing, we'll get to know each other over the coming months/years and grow together :-)
