Young conversions

[JesusFightClub]

Read this post last night. Church this morning...aaargh!

Little explanation first: I attend two churches; the Uniting Church in Australia and an evangelical church. I love the Uniting Church. Reasonably traditional; some hymns, some modern music, good solid sermon, lots of friends, etc. The evangelical church, well, it's not really me. I go because my son loves it but he doesn't like to go on his own. It is all rock music, sermon is a bit light weight for me and there is far too much of the you are a sinner but God loves you anyway stuff.

So, sitting in church playing my usually game of counting how many times the pastor says "fellowship" and "purpose" and the pastor screams out "ARE YOU SAVED?" I had a FreeJinger moment "What the .... is going on?" He continues "I KNOW THERE ARE MANY PEOPLE SITTING IN THIS CHURCH TODAY WHO AREN'T YET SAVED...." It went on and on. This is a church. It's filled with the same people who go every week. The pastor seems to think many of them aren't saved? I'm thinking I've stepped into a parallel time zone or been transported to Texas or something. Maybe Pastor has turned into Dougie Phillips or Bill Gothard. Pastor then goes on to explain why he thinks that the only really type of baptism is full immersion...

Weird! If I remember anything from my period of religious schooling (which I don't much) it's that you can't *know* about other people if they're saved or not!

They can spend every night in a Jacuzzi with a host of nubile concubines or they can wander the streets with a sign round their neck saying "I AM A PAEDO AND WILL MOLEST YOU". They can blow up cars with Northern Irish policemen in them, torture dogs and cats out of a sense of forensic interest or flash their willies at strangers, and you still don't know what God's opinion of them is. (We were taught the blowing up coppers thing was particularly bad, but only if you follow a false religion* while doing it.) At any rate, the best you can do is an educated guess, because God won't tell you his plans for any man (or woman, presumably). So how does this guy get the presumption to say he *knows* that people aren't saved?

*Catholicism. :roll: And yes, I was taught that's a false religion. Even though in fact it's a different branch of Christianity, and if you're a Christian, Catholics are the same along with you.

[debrand]

Being "saved" is very much a Protestant doctrine. In Orthodoxy and Catholicism, you don't do this "acknowledge myself as a wretched sinner bound for hell, there I need to invite Jesus into my heart". While they don't discount adult conversion experiences such as Paul on the way to Damascus, if you are raised Christian you understand that salvation is a life long process, not a one-off. Your supposed to grow in maturity, and demonstrate that maturity throughout your life, say-helping the poor, not commiting criminal acts, controlling your temper, and doing what you can to improve the WORLD. It's not salvation by works, there is no bucket list. You are just expected as someone who claims to be a follower of Jesus to do what is within your power to ease suffering and make the world a little better.

Oh, and there is no "personal relationship". God is God and he is Holy. You pray for peace in the world, not for the Jets to make it to the Superbowl. ;)

The Catholic-and I'd assume Orthodix-position on salvation has always made more sense to me.

[celestial]

I was raised Methodist, and never heard anything about "being saved" or "letting Jesus into your heart" at church. You were baptized as a child, you went to Sunday school to hear Bible stories and tried to do good things, and as a teen you were confirmed. That's all there was to it.

But then I went on a high school youth group trip to a Methodist convention in the South and saw a whole different side to the church! Suddenly I was a lousy sinner who needed to ask Jesus into my heart so I could be saved and go to heaven. I remember the other teens from my church and I looking at each other and going, WTF, then quietly slipping out the back door.

I think that denomination has a lot of differences in its churches-- you might find a more "Catholic-style" one, or you might find a more "fire and brimstone" one.

Anyway, a lot of stuff at that convention really creeped me out. To top it off, the youth minister said to just go along with it because we believed the same stuff, although our worship style was different. I was shocked! If we were meant to believe all that weird stuff, it would have been nice if they'd, you know, told us that at some point. It was the beginning of the end of my relationship with the Methodist church.

[snarkbillie]

I "got saved" at an early age. I was told by my cousins that if I didn't "do it" I would burn in hell forever. Then when I was about 5-6 I prayed again at VBS because the pastor was all very "if you're not 100% sure that if you died tonight" and the whole thing. Then when I was 13 I prayed again and even went down front to "rededicate" even though secretly I was afraid that I was never really saved to begin with, because if you're saved you don't sin. Then at 21 we had a revival and a pretty "famous" (or we were told so) preacher (Bailey Smith) came and gave his "wheat and tares" sermon and I went down again and "got saved" again. This entire time I would also earnestly pray every night before bed that God would truly save me.

It's a huge amount of emotional abuse what goes on.

Pretty sure you can listen to Mr. Smith's sermon online if you really want to get the gist of the issue.

[snarkbillie]

I "got saved" at an early age. I was told by my cousins that if I didn't "do it" I would burn in hell forever. Then when I was about 5-6 I prayed again at VBS because the pastor was all very "if you're not 100% sure that if you died tonight" and the whole thing. Then when I was 13 I prayed again and even went down front to "rededicate" even though secretly I was afraid that I was never really saved to begin with, because if you're saved you don't sin. Then at 21 we had a revival and a pretty "famous" (or we were told so) preacher (Bailey Smith) came and gave his "wheat and tares" sermon and I went down again and "got saved" again. This entire time I would also earnestly pray every night before bed that God would truly save me.

It's a huge amount of emotional abuse what goes on.

Pretty sure you can listen to Mr. Smith's sermon online if you really want to get the gist of the issue.

[Coconut Flan]

Being saved is particularly evangelical and fundie. For me it's a mark of whether I can attend a church or not. To me it's a sign of tolerance or intolerance and a particular boundary that usually the far side of offends me. I, too, attended Methodist churches that never mentioned being saved and then found myself as a teen in one that began sounding as fundy as any IFB church.

[JaChelle Sugar]

The whole "becoming" a Christian thing has always confused me. I don't know how people who are raised in an uber-Christian environment can decided to be "saved" or "become Christian" when they're not really realising anything new. They're just parroting the same tripe that's been repeated to them by their parents since birth.

If you're raised in an environment where all you hear is "Jesus is your saviour"...it shouldn't be a sudden epiphany when you "accept" him, should it? IDK this whole thing confuses me.

And that's the horror of Reformed Protestant (Calvinist) teaching, if the kid's are raised in a 'proper Christian' home there brought up living a certain way but also believe that they have no control over being saved and no 'saying the prayer' or 'asking god into your heart' will make the slightest difference. The upshot is, the poor kids live there lives not knowing if they're saved because the only way they know they're saved is if they display 'the fruit of the spirit' but since they were raised to show those 'fruits' anyway, there was never a moment when they changed.

[Minerva]

I "got saved" at an early age. I was told by my cousins that if I didn't "do it" I would burn in hell forever. Then when I was about 5-6 I prayed again at VBS because the pastor was all very "if you're not 100% sure that if you died tonight" and the whole thing. Then when I was 13 I prayed again and even went down front to "rededicate" even though secretly I was afraid that I was never really saved to begin with, because if you're saved you don't sin. Then at 21 we had a revival and a pretty "famous" (or we were told so) preacher (Bailey Smith) came and gave his "wheat and tares" sermon and I went down again and "got saved" again. This entire time I would also earnestly pray every night before bed that God would truly save me.

It's a huge amount of emotional abuse what goes on.

Pretty sure you can listen to Mr. Smith's sermon online if you really want to get the gist of the issue.

That's what confused me in the brief time I was in a Born-Again bible study group. On one hand, you accept Jesus because you're a sinner who inevitably sins, and there's this confession thing you do when you catch yourself sinning. But then they have this speech about how you can't be a Christian and do X because having Jesus in your life prevents you from doing certain things. Which would be consistent if they were saying that Real Christians don't sin on purpose, but their confessions included all kinds of purposeful sinning. They had just found a way of single out LGBTQ folks that sounded almost logically consistent.

[snarkbillie]

That's what confused me in the brief time I was in a Born-Again bible study group. On one hand, you accept Jesus because you're a sinner who inevitably sins, and there's this confession thing you do when you catch yourself sinning. But then they have this speech about how you can't be a Christian and do X because having Jesus in your life prevents you from doing certain things. Which would be consistent if they were saying that Real Christians don't sin on purpose, but their confessions included all kinds of purposeful sinning. They had just found a way of single out LGBTQ folks that sounded almost logically consistent.

There's a Baptist double-standard at work. If you fuck up you just "backslid" and you can repent and then be a good little Christian again. If someone else does it, it's because they were NEVER a Christian to begin with.

[Bbfamteam]

I was baptized at 13 and then became incredibly miserable because I just couldn't get the whole "living a Christian life" thing down. I thought I was a terrible person and was definitely headed straight for hell because I wasn't like Jesus. It took an evil baby baptizing Lutheran to explain to me the concept of grace 5 years later. I'm not perfect, I don't pretend to be. I would put money on the fact that there are a large group of people out there who would look at my life and tell me I'm headed straight for hell. But they can kiss my happy ass :).

[tropaka]

ah,when I saw the thread title I thought of Imperial to Metric conversions.

I have a 3 yr old; I could teach her that Cookie Monster controlled the Universe and she'd believe it

[sweet_slytherin]

Oh, geez, this brings back memories. I got saved at 4 years old and wanted to be baptized immediately, because that's what good IFBs are supposed to do, right? It'd didn't help that my Sunday School teacher told us *horrific* stories of his childhood and then told us Jesus suffered much worse for us. Anyway, four years later after an AWANAs meeting, I questioned whether I was really saved, so rededicated my life to God. I was finally baptized when I eleven (and the water was COLD because the water heater broke). Now I have cousins around the same age I was when I first got saved, and everyone's all excited when they "ask Jesus into their heart". I don't think kids that young really know what it all entails. I certainly didn't at four years old.

[luckystone]

It's just brainwashing. It depresses me when people give it such a young age. I can't tell if that's the age they remembered their brainwashing, or if they are just making it up.

[RosyDaisy]

I believe in teenager/adult baptism by immersion, but never children because they are not capable of understand scripture, believe that the Bible is the word of God, and believe that Jesus is the Son of God. A young child doesn't yet understand that. Baptism should never be forced on anyone. It's a decision a person make themselves without coercion.

Sorry for the Bible lesson....back to reading other threads now.

[ILoveJellybeans]

I agree with you Rosy, I think teenagers and adults are old enough to understand what baptism is, and should be capable of deciding their own religion. I dont agree with child/baby baptism, I think they should do it when they are old enough to know what it is about.

[Miggy]

My church teaches that infant baptism is about the parents and the church community making a promise to watch over that child and help to raise it within the Christian community. Confirmation is when the person chooses to commit their own life to God. My children were baptised as babies but I never felt this commited them in any way. This was a commitment by myself, my husband, my family and my friends about how we would raise these children. None of my tribe have chosen to be confirmed yet.

I know some churches tend to confirm children at a certain age - my friends in the Anglican Church were all confirmed at 13. Some churches also don't allow you to have communion until you are baptised and confirmed. Both of these things put a lot of pressure on young people.

[DarkAnts]

My church teaches that infant baptism is about the parents and the church community making a promise to watch over that child and help to raise it within the Christian community. Confirmation is when the person chooses to commit their own life to God. My children were baptised as babies but I never felt this commited them in any way. This was a commitment by myself, my husband, my family and my friends about how we would raise these children. None of my tribe have chosen to be confirmed yet.

I know some churches tend to confirm children at a certain age - my friends in the Anglican Church were all confirmed at 13. Some churches also don't allow you to have communion until you are baptised and confirmed. Both of these things put a lot of pressure on young people.

This is the way my church did it too. Thats part of the reason I never encountered being "saved" until I was an adult. The other part was being surrounded by mormons.

[Patsy]

This is something that confuses me. I read Kelly Stamps' blog (run of the mill southern baptist) and she once mentioned how her husband Scott realized well into their marriage that he wasn't really saved, got saved again, and how everything was so much better after that. And of course she'd been pray for this all along. Before that I really had no idea this went on.

How do you know if your saving is real or not?? That would be pretty terrifying considering your eternal fate is riding on it.

Jaynee Lockwood shared a similar experience: http://www.lockwoodfamilytomexico.com/2 ... imony.html (link not broken, she knows about us and has visited before)

[bluelady]

My church teaches that infant baptism is about the parents and the church community making a promise to watch over that child and help to raise it within the Christian community. Confirmation is when the person chooses to commit their own life to God. My children were baptised as babies but I never felt this commited them in any way. This was a commitment by myself, my husband, my family and my friends about how we would raise these children. None of my tribe have chosen to be confirmed yet.

I know some churches tend to confirm children at a certain age - my friends in the Anglican Church were all confirmed at 13. Some churches also don't allow you to have communion until you are baptised and confirmed. Both of these things put a lot of pressure on young people.

Same here. The church I grew up in practises infant baptism and confirmation usually happened at around 13 or 14. It's then that most people start taking communion.

I was confirmed in the church, but I don't think I felt pressured. I know that I didn't get confirmed because of a deep desire to join the church. I did it because a) my parents expected it and b) all of my friends were being confirmed. It was kinda what you did. But, there was no internal struggle about it. I was ok with it. And, even though I am now very much non-practising I am still ok with it.

The word "saved" was never mentioned in my church community. What gets me about the whole thing is the amount of fear that it instills in, not just young people, but everybody. I was always taught that God was a loving figure who wanted the best for people. Certainly not one to be afraid of. I can't imagine living life being afraid all the time and, worse than that, choosing a religion that promotes that fear. It's not something I'd be interested in.

[formergothardite]

Apparently I got saved at like 4 or 5 and baptized soon after that. I honestly don't remember anything about it and in ATI when we were supposed to tell moving salvation stories I totally just made stuff up.

[FeministShrew]

Apparently I got saved at like 4 or 5 and baptized soon after that. I honestly don't remember anything about it and in ATI when we were supposed to tell moving salvation stories I totally just made stuff up.

A few years ago at a Wednesday night service at the Southern Baptist church I was a member of there was a guest speaker. He made everybody stand up & tell how they "got saved." There were only about 15-20 people there (the kids & youth were in their own groups elsewhere), & most of the people claimed to have been pretty young - from 4 to teenaged.

One woman refused to participate. I really wish I had been brave enough not to.

That was actually on e of the last services I went to.

[Trynn]

A few years ago at a Wednesday night service at the Southern Baptist church I was a member of there was a guest speaker. He made everybody stand up & tell how they "got saved." There were only about 15-20 people there (the kids & youth were in their own groups elsewhere), & most of the people claimed to have been pretty young - from 4 to teenaged.

One woman refused to participate. I really wish I had been brave enough not to.

That was actually on e of the last services I went to.

James is pressuring me to "Tell me testimony." I told him exactly what I thought of the idea, and he said, "I'll pray for you" indicating that this was supposed to eventually change my mind. Sigh. Apparently "no" doesn't mean no to some people.

[Curly Girl]

My church teaches that infant baptism is about the parents and the church community making a promise to watch over that child and help to raise it within the Christian community. Confirmation is when the person chooses to commit their own life to God. My children were baptised as babies but I never felt this commited them in any way. This was a commitment by myself, my husband, my family and my friends about how we would raise these children. None of my tribe have chosen to be confirmed yet.

I know some churches tend to confirm children at a certain age - my friends in the Anglican Church were all confirmed at 13. Some churches also don't allow you to have communion until you are baptised and confirmed. Both of these things put a lot of pressure on young people.

I am Catholic and we are getting my son (20 months) baptized in a couple of weeks, mostly because our priest's teaching on baptism is very much what you said about it being about the parents more than the kids.

However, I do not want my son to be doing First Communion or Confirmation until he feels ready. If that's at the usual 7 and 14, great. If it's later than that, that's fine too. I want him to live according to his own conscience, not mine.

[Curly Girl]

My DH had a conversion experience at 3 or 4, and looking back, he definitely didn't understand what he was doing,

[famof4]

It seems to me that the "saved" then baptized experience is all bout me/I. I am sinful. I apologize. I ask to be in a relationship with Jesus.

The infant baptism is more about God then I. God extends grace and forgiveness as a gift. God offers the first hand in the relationship.