This week PBS is offering several free documentaries online, including The Amish: Shunned, which features seven Amish people who have left the fold. I'm eager to watch it.
If you've already seen it, please let us know your thoughts in the comment section. What resonated with you? What would have made it a better documentary?
That's a good idea for the Laestadian church to do, it would be powerful and it would help.
ReplyDeleteI am not sure I understand the previous comment. Are you suggesting that Laestadians should implement shunning?
DeleteUnbeliever
Implement shunning? Isn't what the Laestadian system has done over the decades. I thought it would be good get together a half dozen or more Apostolic Lutheran and Laestadian ex's, those that have had their lives greatly and adversely affected by the Church's wrong teaching. Especially the "we are the exclusive kingdom of God".That can cripple a person for life. Make a documentary of that, especially of people who have succeeded and found the truth and now have a right relationship with /God. There are many who would have powerful testimonies, put it on video with a good moderator, a person's story with puestions and answers
ReplyDeleteGotcha. That makes sense
DeleteUnbeliever
Matthew 24:8
Delete"All these are the (what?) beginning of sorrows."
I imagine the word "sorrows" is translated a little differently in the newer translations. But I'm betting that some of them use the word, "travail." The better translation of this word, "sorrows" is "travail," because the analogy Jesus uses is the birth pains of a mother approaching delivery. The earth is being prepared for a delivery. So this is why the term is used. This is all the beginning of travail. All of you who have been involved in childbirth, either as mothers in the core of it all, or as fathers as onlookers, know that our wives and our moms, when those first signs of approaching birth occur, were not having severe pains. They were uncomfortable, but they weren't all that severe. When you approach delivery, we all know that the birth pains increase in intensity and in their frequency.
So as you come through this seven years (tribulation), this is exactly what Jesus likens it to. That the events of this wrath and vexation are going to be relatively light, and maybe far apart. But as you move on through that seven years, they're going to increase in their intensity. So that by the time you get out toward the end, it's just going to be unbelievable! And that's why the last three and a half years, Jesus will refer to as the time of great Tribulation. Because it's approaching the delivery. Now then, why did He use the analogy of a delivery? Because the world, the earth, is going to be delivered from the curse. That's the whole idea of this seven years of Tribulation. Satan is going to be paid off. The whole picture of Scripture is that Satan is holding the mortgage of the planet. He's the god of this world tonight.
The curse has been plaguing us since Genesis Chapter 3. But the Tribulation is going to pay off that mortgage. The result of that Tribulation will be the delivery of the planet from the curse. And then you have the Kingdom come in, and you'll have it revert back like it was in the Garden of Eden. So the earth has to go through its pangs of delivery. JJC
Oops, this reply is for anonymous 5/11/15. JJC
DeleteI'm trying to find out what it is about birth pains, that we should know about, The Bible says that the end is getting near when it's like a woman having birth pains. I can see the earthquakes and wars and everything else going on, but how does that relate? They are random, does birth pains have a way of telling when? I'm a man so I don't know. I got other troubles.
ReplyDeleteAll block buster events happen during one of the 7 major Jewish feast day's.The first 4 feasts, passover, unleavened bread, first fruits and Pentecost were fulfilled within a 50 day period of time. That was the death , burial , resurrection of Jesus, then Pentecost, when the church was born. They were fulfilled in the same order that God have them to Moses. If you are looking for timing, the remaining 3 Jewish feasts are a good place to look, and those are the fall feast days. Feast of trumpets, Atonement, and ?. I think it's tabernacles.-.....Bert
ReplyDeleteI watched it and thought it was very interesting. There are ample parallels with Laestadianism, but the Amish are much worse when it comes to shunning and separation. There's certainly no official shunning in the LLC, and I think the hesitancy of LLC believers to associate with their friends and family who have "given up their faith" is largely due to insecurity. They just don't want to be confronted by problems with their faith, even the bare existence of a person who once believed as they did but decided otherwise.
ReplyDeleteI recently had a pleasant visit with someone who I hadn't spoken with since leaving the church. After some initial awkwardness, it felt (to me, at least) like we just picked up where we left off. We part with plans for a sauna sometime soon, and I'm looking forward to it.
We're all just people.
Ed,
DeleteI suspect that it may depend on the community as well as the particular family dynamics. When I was in the LLC, there were very clear differences in atmosphere and attitude between places like Wolf Lake and Minneapolis, or Phoenix or Seattle. It also may depend on things such as is there a history in this particular congregation of hiding sexual abuse etc.
It seems to me the more there is to hide, the more fierce people have been about making those who leave feel unwelcome.
I had people who were distant relatives, but close to my parents say things like "we hope bad things happen to you so you know the error of your ways"...this after i lost a baby. I had close friends tell me not to come around because they didn't want me being a bad influence on their kids...you would think i was drinking or had a drug problem or something...but I just fell in love with the wrong person.
Unbeliever
Flora: Good points Ed and Unbeliever. Many are getting better in this generation with the idea of living and letting live when someone leaves the church. And staying friendly/friends even. And when they don't, it's out of fear for their own shaky grasp on the chimera of their faith's truth. But it is true that there are many different atmospheres at the LLC churches, (despite the protestations of total unity!) and some are more likely to shun than others. Or at least really steer clear. Which is the same as shun, I guess.
ReplyDelete