Janet, a prayer request for knowing which direction to turn in a situation like this, to me, seems pretty appropriate. And you’ve also made a great point. There’s a problem with this forum regarding Satan’s infiltration of it. And it pretty much hits like clockwork. Even I’ve been hit with his attacks. Often times we will get inundated here with people who join to cause trouble, to test God’s children with their knowledge of the Bible, of the gospel. We have people who come to share what they believe “helping the lost find the truth” through false doctrine, teachers and gospels they share. People who come to cause strife just because they have nothing to do and who better than to mess with the “Bible thumpers”.
One of the things I noticed when I first joined is that not everyone who comes here IS part of the body of Christ. Not a part of the Church and that’s not really a bad thing. There are those who are trying to find guidance and direction to Christ which really is why this forum exists from my understanding. The BONUS however, is that an online Church group who worship with brethren from Hawaii and join and share and help expand our knowledge, increase our love and educate on certain issues and topics that otherwise we find difficult to gather information and help with.
Something I have said and it’s annoying to some to read for the millionth time regarding what we witness here; One of the most difficult things in the world is to argue without passion and to meet arguments without wounding.
This forum does exceptionally well at forgetting that and often times people are very passionate about their stance on a topic, or they don’t accept an open mindset to a statement and take it personally. Instead of making a point to share a different angle, often times people make a point to be right, sparing no expense on the stance.
While I could go on and on (I’m good at that, what can I say), I will end my sharing with you on this note (Perhaps an E flat) A great number of posts are dependent on those who wish to argue a point while others do not need the arguing but rather levity with calm and peace to read through. There are a great number of posts I refuse to engage on and your sentiment is the reason why. I can’t stand confrontation. As some brethren have indicated, while we are a family-in-Christ, family is the secondary descriptor here. We will see disagreements and bickering. We’ll see people talk behind one’s back and people trying to look cute and witty with a comment directed towards someone yet be passive aggressive with it. We’ll witness people trying to talk down to one another with their vocabulary and their beliefs while others get out in left field with their idea of acceptability in a Church family.
Where some see cartoons as the Devil’s cauldron, others see it as mindless entertainment. Where one appreciates music, the other sees it as celebration of evil. Where one sees recipes for good eating, others see eating of sacrificial food. My favorite though: Expanding on a child-like thought blowing up to a philosophical vs scriptural battle that ought not be.
We’re sinners after all, Janet and, we learn the hard way. The Church in and of itself is a Church I would welcome with open arms. It’s easier to discover who wants to be there for worship and who doesn’t in a physical sense. On here, it’s a little more difficult and being an open forum…it’s even more difficult to weed out those who are just here to cause trouble.
This is the last - last thing though, I promise; God’s comfort and peace is in you always outside of any environment. Your statement that when you’re here you feel deflated and hopeless - we feel it too. I’m not trying to sway you to stay if you wish to leave but rather, if you need to talk, talk. Many of us will listen. Don’t know how well we’ll respond, but we’ll listen. And around here…prayer requests are always received and often responded to…like NOW!
Merciful and Loving Heavenly Father
The darkness of this world infiltrates our area of the internet often and causes chaos and strife where none should be. We still walk in the flesh at times around here and sometimes, often times we screw up and we have our fights and carnality seeps in. We even go so far as to inject our own emotions into what is shared and allow pride to stumble us at times.
Lord, we pray that You will not only forgive us but have mercy on us for our misgivings in this, a digital display of discipleship and being a child of God. We ask that through the furtherance of our walk with You, that our pace increases and our paths straightened in Your hands as we are meant to be ambassadors of Christ on this world, including the digital. Please guide us out of the prisons we’ve made for ourselves in this life and direct us to the open arms of Christ.
Please galvanize us with protection from those not of You, Abba, and bring us to understanding on the same level towards how we are approached and how we approach those who seek guidance in the Lord. Please bless @JanetW with calm and peace in her heart and mind and deliver her to the answers and solutions she needs, especially within her decision on should she stay or should she go. Sometimes, we need that notification of someone’s observations of our actions as a whole to see how far we’re drifting and to bring it back on track. I pray this will help bring us back on track.
Bless Janet with an overabundance of joy in her heart as we ask You to revitalize the Holy Spirit within her to overflowing so all those she encounters are touched by Him and we pray You continually are heard even in that small quiet voice to Janet in all her actions, thoughts, and words both in the world we walk in, and the digital we sit in.
We pray this in Jesus’ name
Amen
In any case, I pray that those that have been deceived, or are trying to deceive, be met by the power of our Lord Jesus and humbled into recognizing they need to get right with Him.
