We've been warned...

We've been warned...

We are now "outside of fundamentalism" while we are visiting this church. The man who warned us is someone we knew from a previous church we went to that was firmly inside fundamentalism. I guess he wanted to make sure we knew we were in a different camp. ----Oh, yeah. We figured that much out before we ever came to any of the care groups or to a church service. There are a lot of fundy hills that we're not going to die on. The style of music is just one of them. I couldn't care less whether there are electric guitars and drums or violins and flutes. If my boys never wear a tie to church again, so what. The last time I checked the Holy Spirit was still part of the trinity and I don't mind Him in church either.

No one in the PCA warned us that we were outside of fundamentalism, they just welcomed us to orthodoxy and were glad we had left Arminian beliefs(fundamentalism). To be fair, there are somehow those who consider themselves to be 5 pointers and are still in fundamentalism and yet not necessarily even a Reformed Baptist. I don't understand that.

I'm not exactly sure which part of the differences besides music and gifts are the ones which cross the fundamentalism line. I don't really care either. I'm not sure if its a "in your face I don't care what they think" or if it's because I see what these people have, and I want it so badly, that it doesn't matter that to get it, I have to "leave" fundamentalism. There is a lot we don't know about what this church believes in practical ways like "How involved can/should Christians be in politics?" I have gotten a taste of the fellowship this church has and I want more. It doesn't matter that the churches I came from wouldn't approve. They don't approve of the basic doctrines of grace I now hold so dear. So what's a little more disapproval? There is so much I need to learn over the right way or learn for the first time.

To my husband and I we left fundamentalism is stages.
First we left the "don't drink the kool-aid" dictatorship type of fundamentalism.(it's scary)
Second we left the guilt trip, work your butt off so God is happy with you, but you can wear pants(sometimes) type of fundamentalism.
Third we left the really nice kind that helps you out a lot when you need it, but once you need serious help you are now a designated project. If you ever graduate beyond project; then you must turn someone else into your project. It's hard to be transparent without someone turning you into a project, when all you want is a friend.

I don't know that we have left orthodoxy because it seems to me that every type of presby thinks the others are either too strict or too loose. I do think that the presby's will join together in saying that just because a church calls themselves reformed doesn't mean its so because they at least have to be Presbyterian for them to be truly reformed. Oh well, I guess we'll just "love God and enjoy Him forever" without man's approval.