Pray and see hwat happens. If you like the new church it might the right time for a move, just make sure you leave teh last church with it's blessing. In other words talk with an elder or the pastor, to give them a heads up.

Stuff to read there is tons....the ooze is a good place to start as is the Resurgence.

Thanks Malsteem. Surfin' over to Resurgence to check'em out. My wife & I are planning on visiting a few other churches in the near future. We have a trip planned for Rob Bell's church next month. So looking forward to that visit.

Hi Dizzy,
There's a book called the Post Charismatic by Rob someone which i can highly recommend as a helpful resource.

Also i would encourage you not to drop the holy spirit - for me, being an emerging post-charismatic it's more about admitting to our role in creating the hype that surrounds the apparent work of the spirit, that the spirit moves where she may and we have very little involvement in conjuring that up. We don't need to demand her presence or pray her into being - we may shake, we may not - it's so unimportant. In the bible the spirit produced action - in charismatic circles it tends to produce a static inward looking "dwelling" - that's when you know it's feeding our doubts and insecurities rather than inspiring us to change the world. The holy spirit works in a thousand different ways - let her work and don't believe the hype :)

Cheers
Robin

Thanks everyone for your comments. I am still struggling.....it is very hard to remove the past's strangeness from my heart & head.

I grew up in the 70's Charismatic movement in Northern Illinois. We did not go to "church". Instead we had "prayer meetings" every Friday nite at someones house or in the basement of a large Catholic church. The leadership consisted of 12 group leaders who would sit in front and face everyone. We would sing all the cool church songs from the 70's & read the bible. The service would always lead to everything from speaking in tongues, laying on of hands, personal prophesies, visions, people being "slain" in the spirit", etc. I was 13 at the time. As the years progressed, the "group" leaders decided that we must all live closer to each other. My parents moved next door to the "leaders". The "leaders" started to get more controlling. We had to pray each day & ask the Lord what we should to that day, make out a "schedule" & back everything up with scripture. Before we could do this schedule, we had to be "clean". That meant that we had to remove the "demons" that controlled us. This was done by rebuking them & the blowing them out of our bodies. Yes I know that was freaky but it's the truth. Once the demons were "confirmed" loosed from our bodies, I could then submit my schedule to my parents & the leaders. This was an everyday thing. They in turn would pray about it & ask God if this was from him. This was called "confirming". If the leadership had a personal prophesy for you, they would require you to pray about it even before you read it or heard it from them. It would be used to expose your weaknesses or to point out your"problems".
By this time I was a senior in High school. This process got worse. It was to the point that I had to pray about everything, from going to a movie to playing outside. If my parents or the leadership prayed & got a "different" answer from God then I was not allowed to do it. Needless to say, I faked most of it & the leadership never knew.
Fast forward to today. I still belong to a semi-charismatic church. The control is not the same. The "gifts" are still present but not as overwhelming. I have been struggling with the fact that after 30 something years of the Charismatic stuff, I have yet to see where this is actually doing any good. I hear the same stuff week after week. I see the "laying on of hands" with nothing concrete happening. I am so disillusioned.....
I am just looking for help. I get so tired of watching this religious "ritual" & nothing ever seems to get better for the people going through it. To me it just seems that God is not that complicated & our salvation is not based on "schedules" or "personal prophesies".........God has to be more simple than that......isn't he?

Simple answer. Yes. Enjoy your new found freedom.

Hey Dizzy!

One book that I had read is called The Emerging Church by Dan Kimball, and another one that I am looking forward to reading is Post-Modern Pilgrims: First Century Passion for the 21st Century World by Leonard Sweet. Maybe reading one of these can be of help to you in exploring the emerging church.

While I am still trying to figure out what this movement is all about as well, I think that it is an exciting time for the church. People who are disenchanted with the traditional church, Christians and non-Christians, are finding others ways to worship and to connect with God. The emerging church is a return to the way that first-century churches were structured, meeting in small groups, in homes, with experiential and participatory worship. While I don't think that it's the way that everyone has to worship, I think that the emerging church is offering a spiritual experience to people who are seeking that. It's not neccessary for you to switch churches, unless you want to, but in my opinion, all Christians should be supporting the emerging church as it is reaching more and more people with the Gospel--the good news of Christ's death and resurrection through which we have eternal life in heaven!

I agree with Arty in his response to enjoy your freedom in Christ. While living a life as a Christianity should not neccessarily be easy, we have that comfort in our faith of Christ's unconditional sacrifice and love. I don't think that it's wrong to listen and seek God's will, but God has also given us freedom as Christians. God does not just have one plan for our lives, but rather has plans, which he will work through no matter what decisions we make. I don't believe that God wants to dictate our every move, otherwise he would not have given us free will as humans.

I grew up in the penthousecostal movement. home to many wandering believers who could never seem to get over them selves. what you thought was not important, biblical, or sane. i needing to be filled with the tongues to be sure of my salvation. well' i don't speak in tongues and i now belive the pentecostal-charismatic movement is a cult. but so is rob bell's ideas. i love the LOVE WINS thing. that's funny... so i guess we here in the emergent denomination can maybe call ourselves
agnosticostal? cheers...

Everyone thank you for your insight and advice. I decided to start a blog to ask some of those questions concerning what I was taught in the Charismatic Movement. I would hope that through a blog I could reach more people. Please feel free to visit my blog at questions-faith.blogspot.com . God bless

devernthemystic said:

penthousecostal

devernthemystic said:

agnosticostal?

@devernthemystic, I think I'd love for you to elaborate on these two words alone...