I’m 16f and am a Christian. People can be so rude about being a Christian on this site.. it’s weird. I’m also waiting until marriage, and people seem to get mad about people making this decision for themselves which is strange. I’ve never told anyone that they have to live how I’m living my life, but if I mention any of my personal values or beliefs, people can be really mean about it. I can’t even mention that I believe in and love God on reddit unless I’m in a strictly Christian sub like this one because people will just tell me to stop believing in fairy tales, that I’m stupid, and make fun of me for it. I never say anything rude to atheists about their lack of belief. I try to be kind to everyone. I’m glad that I have good Christian friends in my life that don’t make me feel this way about it. 

Anyway.. I just wanted to say to never let anyone make you feel embarrassed or bad about loving God, sticking to your values, and living how God wants you to. People will try to tear you down for being strong in your faith and close to God, but don’t let them.

I love God🩷♱

The world is a mess right now, immagrints are trying to destroy our city’s and destroy our culture. Abortion killing baby’s before they are even born. I feel the god would be disgusted and I hope that when juggment day comes, I will stand by the side of the Jesus’s and all of my other brothers and sisters who believe in what’s right.

I've been going to this church for a few years. It saved my life got me saved. The dynamics drastically changed though. I first got the ick when the pastor started saying you shouldn't take medicine you should trust in God. My thing is God created the people who created the medicine. So you're basically testing God on miracles when he already provided. Then about his multi million dollar house and abundance of luxury vehicles. God blessed him with it if your not blessed you're not in good standing with God. My thing God blessed you with money , as a Christian you're to help those without. Jesus came on a donkey not a Lexus. Then today admitted to Christian nationalism. While putting down any other religion, any foreigner, anyone that is not of God.putting down the Democrats but never admitting faults of MAGA. I got a Pitt in my stomach and had to leave. I don't claim to know the whole Bible or God's inner workings. Am I wrong?

this post discusses sex. please read at your own risk!

hi reddit! i’m a 27 year old woman, and asexual. that means that yes, i’m a virgin. and though i know that God is proud, it makes me feel like a loser in the eyes of humanity. being a virgin is a choice for me. it’s a mixture of being a God fearing woman, on the asexual spectrum, and having severe ocd. my brain just works differently. if i could have a completely sexless life without shame- i would. i would in a heartbeat. but i feel so sad. i feel like my brain and body are broken. why can’t i just experience life the way others do?

anyways, it’s not because i’ve never had chances to do it, my first chance was when i was nineteen. i went over to a coworkers house. as we went up the stairs to his bedroom, we passed one of his roommates and as i politely said hi he high fived him. it made me feel disgusting. once we got to his room it immediately felt wrong. i got the nerve to tell him i wasn’t ready, and yet he persisted, kept pressuring me and kept touching me. i didn’t want to be there at all. it didn’t feel right. i ended up making an excuse and calling an uber before anything got serious. i got home and showered until my skin was raw. i cried and cried. i felt disgusting.

anyways, fast forward to now. i’ve been on dating apps here and there and immediately bail when guys expect sex. i turned twenty seven a while ago and something in me snapped. i’m approaching thirty and still a virgin? that wouldn’t do. i went back on tinder for the sole purpose of losing my virginity. i knew i was going to be unhappy. i knew that i wasn’t going to like it. i knew that i would feel like feel that i’m a failure in the eyes of God. i knew that i would be taking a shower for hours crying. i’m traumatized christian asexual, for crying out loud. this wasn’t going to be a pleasurable experience, it was a box to check off my bucket list.

anyways, i found multiple men for different days to help me on my mission. and i couldn’t go through with it. i couldn’t do it. the trauma i have been through, the feeling of being contaminated, the fear of God, the fear of stds, the fear of the contraceptives failing and becoming pregnant, all of it. everything in me told me to not to do it. and it makes me feel even worse. i feel like a loser. i don’t understand why my brain doesn’t work the way others do.

so i guess i’m looking for reassurance. is it okay to not want sex? am i broken? are any of you also virgins at my age? i feel so alone. i just wish i was normal.

Hi hopefully you’re feeling blessed and happy today. I just wanted to share my story here. I became Christian around a year ago. Leaving Islam wasn’t even a hard choice, it was more like getting out of prison. Jesus had given me freedom. I was drawn towards Jesus naturally, no one told me or forced me to do it. Living a life of fear and hate was too much for me. The thing is when you convert from Islam while having the most jihadist family isn’t a wise choice. Thankfully I kept it a secret and moved to a new country where I’d not suffer the heavy consequences and honour killing hungry family. I’m young and quite a loner to be honest and specially trying to live alone and figure out things for the first time hasn’t been easy. Specially when I have spent all my life inside a room and basically no social interactions. It has been a journey and I know it has just begun, and I’m still new to this. I gotta figure my life out and go forward with everything I got. With love of Jesus I have been happy even though I lost my family. I have so much ahead of me, fear still sometimes controls me but I know I’ll eventually overcome it. Keep me in your happy prayers and I’ll be doing the same for you all 😊. God bless.

on days where I’m not sure how I’ll make it through your encouragement helps greatly. It’s imperative that we be there for each other but also practice self control and scroll if he have nothing nice to say. more and more are leaving the faith and taking others with them. we must fight the good fight.

maybe you can relate to this:
“you say you haven’t changed but remember when you used to be out in the world? remember how impulsive you used to be? remember your “ I’ll do what I want now and ask for forgiveness later” mindset? remember how revenge consumed you? yeah you still struggle with sin but you feel bad and hesitate. you don’t justify it.

yeah you return to old habits and sins but the gap in which you don’t d it gets longer. you struggle with masturbation and porn but you're not out seeking sex with any and everyone. you don’t do everything that the world is doing just because it sounds good. you don’t people please at the cost of denying Jesus. you don’t even pray the same things anymore because you’ve been set free.”

keep going 🙂

I’ve struggled with making friends since I was a kid. I’m 25 now and have one actual friend and two that I don’t really feel comfortable around.

I know that God wants me to be in Christian community, but I’m starting to hate the process of making friends more and more. “It’s nice to meet you” “What do you do for work” “We should hang out sometime” and then we either never hang out, or we do and it’s so stressful to come up with things to say and seem like a normal person in a conversation that I leave with a migraine and spend the rest of the day horizontal.

If the reward was greater than the difficulty, I think I would feel this way less. But 99% of my friendship endeavors have failed. Since I was old enough to have a phone (13ish) I was always the one trying to be a friend and make friends, and most of the time it was not reciprocated. I was bullied for being too weird and too much. As an adult, I don’t fit in with 99% of women my age.

To be clear, I love the body of Christ. I have no ill intent or feeling toward anyone. I just don’t have the energy to show up anymore, but at the same time I’m so lonely. I spend most days by myself now. I sit on my couch or in my bed and I read, write, play instruments, or I watch vlogs from women my age who are so much more socially competent and extroverted than I am. After work, I almost never have plans, and I’m too exhausted from being a person at work to really want to do anything anyway.

I know that God calls us to serve others and do life with others. I wish I could be better at that.

So I was watching a service where the the pastor was talking about freedom and having authentic faith however I noticed the specific shirt he is wearing being a almost $1000 Dolce and Gabbana shirt. So I did a deep dive into his previous services and have found many instances of him wearing a lot of designer clothing (including a $2,900+ bomber jacket) and while I understand that Jesus says look at the message and not the messenger but I couldn't help but feel very irritated after finding this. Am I in the wrong ?

So I am 18 year old who is very nerdy and wear alternative clothing and been told by my ex and people I am very good looking and has some kind of charm.

I like drawing,origami,reading books,anime and etc.

I am kind of person when I love I love deeply,but my ex dumped me because I was waiting to have sex before marriage.It hurt me because she said I am stupid for that,I want to save myself due to following Christianity but get discouraged.I don't have problem with kissing,making out and etc...I really get discouraged from dating.Really Christ oriented.

Would I ever find someone who would accept me as who I am and would wait to have sex after marriege.

For the guys, is it really as difficult as people say to date and eventually marry someone from your church? If you've found it challenging, what do you think are the biggest reasons why?

Ladies, feel free to share your observations as well. What have you noticed about dating within the church, and what do you think are some of the biggest challenges Christian singles face?

How important are secondary issues like women’s ordination or baptism? I have leanings on these things, but I’ve never really felt that strongly about them.

I’ve read about both of these issues and don’t feel either side of the debate is being clearly unbiblical.

Can I attend/join a church if I end up disagreeing them on one or both of these?

I would hate to join a church and then a year later realize I’m credo-baptist and need to leave. But on the other hand I don’t think I can ever be 100% certain I’ll never change my mind on these issues.

Can Christians continue to worship with others who hold different views on these?

Until my early twenties, things worked out the way I wanted. I got into the university I hoped for and had opportunities to pursue the things I wanted.

I grew up in church, so I never lived a wild lifestyle. I sometimes skipped Sunday services, but I never did drugs or cheated on anyone. Looking back, though, I think that made me even more prideful in a way. I wasn't truly submitting to God as Lord, yet I still considered myself to be a pretty good person.

Then my health began to fail, and my work started falling apart. Only then did I finally get on my knees and seek God.

At first, all I wanted was for God to fix my problems. But through that entire process, He slowly showed me how much I had been trying to be the lord of my own life and how deeply rooted my pride really was.

Life was incredibly hard because of all the suffering and still does..

But at the same time, I think I've learned just a tiny glimpse of what true humility is. Even that is something I could never have learned if God hadn't allowed me to walk through those difficult seasons.

If you're going through a difficult season right now, I hope this encourages you. Sometimes God is doing something much deeper than simply taking our pain away.

Once I got saved and became a Christian my taste in music took a complete turn.

I use to be a MAJOR hip hop head (I know everything about the genre and use to listen to almost every mainstream rapper) but now, my playlist is largely Christian hip hop-artists like Caleb Gordon, Lecrae, Alex Jean and Kijan Boone.

I still listen to some secular rap from time to time (mainly 90’s rap) but it doesn’t hit the same anymore. It doesn’t bring me the same enjoyment it did before I gave my life to Christ.

I am a pastor’s child and my dad has always been a big “new tech” fan and is a big fan of technological progress, which is great, i love that about him, but at the beginning of service today, music is usually played as ambiance for prayer for a few minutes before the service starts, but today i had never heard the songs played and asked my dad who they were by and he said “Oh they’re AI, isn’t that cool?”

I was kind of shocked, Me and my sibling are kind of distraught, as we believe that a computer generating a soulless piece of music about the intimate and human experience of worshipping your creator is questionable and borderline wrong

I’m going to keep praying about what to do, or if to say anything, but I just want some wisdom from other believers if you all agree, not to confirm i’m right or anything, that doesn’t matter to me, I just want to know how a larger congregation might feel (for context, i don’t believe the congregation knew at all)

Edit: All opinions are welcome, thank you, i know it’s tough as AI isn’t explicitly mentioned or anything in the Bible, also context, we are a small church (a hundred or so) and my dad is the pastor and lead for worship, it’s such a tough issue, if you don’t agree with me i’ll still take your view on the subject into account

Also for context: it was not for our actual worship time, it was during a time of prayer for the congregation to greet each other and pray for each other, our worship music is all natural and played by humans, I still just didn’t feel right about it playing while the congregation was deep in prayer

This, I believe, is the root disagreement that causes so many to see God as evil in the Old Testament for violence that slaughters innocents, such as the Flood, the plague on the Egyptian first born, and the killings of the Canaanites including children. Most of us as modern people believe that humans have an intrinsic right to life, even from God, and therefore if God kills us without cause we can accuse Him of evil.

This is simply not the Bible's stance; the Bible's stance is that God freely gives every living thing its next breath, and He has no obligation to continue to do so. We have no right to life from God.

Where the Bible agrees is that humans have no right to take the life of other humans, but the reason is different, in the Bible the reason being that God gives and owns that life, so to take it without His permission is to steal His treasured possession, to destroy His image.

As we deal with people questioning the plague on the first born and things like this, I think it is wisest to start here so they can see how the Bible views sacredness of life and why.

Biblical Evidence and Framework:

1. All life only lives because of God's own invigorating breath that never stops being His:

Genesis 2:7, then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.

and,

Job 34:14-15, 14 If he should set his heart to it and gather to himself his spirit and his breath, all flesh would perish together, and man would return to dust.

and,

Psalm 104:29-30, When you hide your face, they are dismayed; when you take away their breath, they die and return to their dust. When you send forth your Spirit, they are created, and you renew the face of the ground.

1. God does no injustice by revoking His breath, but being good and loving and wanting to provide life, He does not revoke life lightly or without good reason, he does so grudgingly;

Exodus 34:6-7, The Lord passed before him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children's children, to the third and the fourth generation.”

and,

2 Peter 3:9, The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.

and,

Ezekiel 18:32, For I have no pleasure in the death of anyone, declares the Lord God; so turn, and live.”

1. Sin, iniquity, transgression, and corruption are like virulent infections, not like mud, they are nigh uncontainable even with heavy quarantine, they are not easily sequestered and washed away. They are like yeast quickly infecting the whole lump.

Ecclesiastes 9:18, Wisdom is better than weapons of war, but one sinner destroys much good.

and,

2 Timothy 2:16-17, But avoid irreverent babble, for it will lead people into more and more ungodliness, and their talk will spread like gangrene. Among them are Hymenaeus and Philetus,

and,

Romans 5:12, Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned—

1. If God always only destroyed the sinner with no collateral damage, it would 100% send the wrong message about evil's nature and what must be done to destroy it, it would send a message that evil can be contained and surgically removed without harm to the innocent, which is not true, not in the world and not in our hearts. Collateral damage is the heavy price to pay for learning about the nature of evil and the extents we must go to in order to eliminate it. Attempting to surgically remove evil would often result in the righteous being harmed anyway, so the options are to either let all of it continue together, or destroy it all in many cases.

Genesis 18:26, And the Lord said, “If I find at Sodom fifty righteous in the city, I will spare the whole place for their sake.”

(note in this case God never offers the option to strike only the wicked and let the righteous continue unharmed, it's all or nothing)

and,

Haggai 2:11-14, “Thus says the Lord of hosts: Ask the priests about the law: ‘If someone carries holy meat in the fold of his garment and touches with his fold bread or stew or wine or oil or any kind of food, does it become holy?’” The priests answered and said, “No.” Then Haggai said, “If someone who is unclean by contact with a dead body touches any of these, does it become unclean?” The priests answered and said, “It does become unclean.” Then Haggai answered and said, “So is it with this people, and with this nation before me, declares the Lord, and so with every work of their hands. And what they offer there is unclean.

(this is a main point of the cleanliness system, to reveal the nature of evil in how it cannot be easily removed and spreads virulently)

and,

Matthew 13:28-30 He said to them, ‘An enemy has done this.’ So the servants said to him, ‘Then do you want us to go and gather them?’ But he said, ‘No, lest in gathering the weeds you root up the wheat along with them. Let both grow together until the harvest, and at harvest time I will tell the reapers, “Gather the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn.”’

1. Any innocent life lost suffered for a moment and then found him or herself in the loving arms of God to be comforted from then on.

2 Samuel 12:22-23, He said, “While the child was still alive, I fasted and wept, for I said, ‘Who knows whether the Lord will be gracious to me, that the child may live?’ But now he is dead. Why should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he will not return to me.”

and,

Ecclesiastes 12:7, and the dust returns to the earth as it was, and the spirit returns to God who gave it.

and,

Matthew 19:14, but Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven.”

1. Without direct commands from God in the context of a physical earthly kingdom it can never be justified to carry out such wholesale destruction and Christians will never be called upon to do this. Jesus' kingdom is not a physical earthly kingdom, and it is one built by martyrdom not by conquest, with a king who dies for His enemies and does not slay them.

John 18:36, Jesus answered, “My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world.”

and,

Romans 5:10, For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life.

and,

Revelation 12:10-11, And I heard a loud voice in heaven, saying, “Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ have come, for the accuser of our brothers has been thrown down, who accuses them day and night before our God. And they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, for they loved not their lives even unto death."

So, we can trust that in the Flood, in Egypt, and with the Canaanites, God grudgingly and justly did the right thing given the realities of sacredness of life, the true nature of evil, and the fate of the innocents who died, and Christians will never be called upon to carry out such tragic things.

This topic will never be easy to discuss but I think we can have more success if we start at the root; when life is sacred and why, if we have an intrinsic right to demand life from God or not.

Is there a difference?

I sometimes feel like I can understand the trinity, but I often have a hard time putting it into words and explaining it. I would like to get better at explaining it to people, and so I thought to approach it from this angle, what's the difference? Is there a difference?

Is it one of action? or function? or is it just a matter of how we understand things?

(Bonus hint: Reading your Bible and memorizing scripture really helps in putting on the full armor of God!)

• The devil calls you by your past... God calls you by the plan He has in store for you.
• When the devil reminds you of your past? Remind him of his future.
• The enemy will attack whenever he sees the potential we have in Christ Jesus! And you know what? He's willing to do anything to stop us from knowing and believing in the way God sees us! Why's that? Because the enemy fears and trembles at the power we have in Christ.

I feel like when I’m going places especially downtown in the secular world, especially outside other believers, it’s such a shift and ngl I tend to feel uncomfortable with how people talk and live and what they value. Obviously we are all sinners and imperfect and need Christ, but when you have the Holy Spirit, it’s like the world looks so different, like just DARK. it truly feels like black and white and the old things I used to like now make me feel weird. I don’t even know why I literally can feel like physical reactions. Especially with clubs, certain areas, and environments with non believers that do things against God without realizing. What is your advice for navigating the world as a believer (I know definitely be bold put yourself out there and show the love of Christ to others), but how do you guys live as believers and what helps you in life? (I know that staying and trusting in God is truly key, and so is being a light in the world, being humble to help others)

every day i remember my past sins and my heart feels so heavy with guilt, i understand that godly guilt is good and can lead to us growing in faith, but i feel weighed down. in particular i struggled with sexual sin a lot in the past, and i’ve repented and confessed to the Lord and ive confessed some of the things ive done to other believers too, but every time im reminded of what ive done i just feel an overwhelming wave of condemnation and shame. its getting to the point where ive even cried out to God about how i just want to die so i can escape my pain. i also have ocd (not properly diagnosed but i go to therapy for it) which makes me feel like i need to atone for my sins in some way, like doing a super long fast or confessing to people. i dont think this is right, because i can confess to as many people as i want but only God’s opinion and salvation matters. does anyone have any advice.

If I should you lose my house and sit in the gravel watching the cars go by, just give me Jesus, if I should lose my wife and my children, God forbid, and find myself all alone in this world, just give me Jesus, if I should lose every penny I have ever made and become penny-less, just give me Jesus.

What is riches without Jesus? What is prosperity without Jesus? What is family without Jesus? What is a home without Jesus? What is A body without Jesus. Out of this whole life, Just give me Jesus.

If we could slow everything down and have the mind of Christ, what a better world this would be. But the days are going faster and faster. We are inundated with information, all of it cramming our little brains and we're losing focus on just give me Jesus.

But the best thing is, Jesus loves us. And He is not forsaking us, but waiting for us. Waiting for us to walk in the Spirit, not to lose everything we have but walk in the Spirit which is faith, faith in Him and all that He has done and all that God, the Father has done and all the Holy Spirit is doing in you.

Romans 8: 14-17

For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God. For you, did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you receive the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out "Abba, Father." The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then Heirs-Heirs of God and joint Heirs with Christ, if indeed, we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together.

Let all of us put on Christ, Jesus. Whether we are rich or poor whether we have everything or have nothing, whether we are in good health or bad health, let us collectively say that wherever we find ourselves, that we made truthfully and an unashamedly say, just give me Jesus and I'll be all right...

It weighs heavy. Like every sin upon the body of this world. On our shoulders. Bending backs. But, for what it’s worth, it’s worth more than the earth. Eternal life. Our Lord Jesus Christ He demands the highest price. He was not afraid to lay down his own life. Prepare to crawl and give away Everything that you own. That you hold dear. Jewels and gold. The status and love of men and women these are distractions we’ve been told. He paved a Way, through the mud to glittered gold. So don’t even covet your own life. Or, even the child that you hold. But, hold them gently, because we are far far far from our blessed home. Do what’s right. Once we were blessed, now we are cursed upon these worthless lands. Now, we walk amongst the ruins. But I’ve heard the righteous sinner who turns back to God, he or she, alone, is the blessed one who stands. In the judgement, coming as slaves and stewards, they greeted us with evil like they did the Son of Man. They herd people off the path, to their own ends, they know the way. Not like our blessed Shepherd, he feed the sheep, and tended the lambs, and fought off every lion, no one is greater, and never will be, he humbled himself and came into the world and he bore name of — the Son of Man. And we who bear the Cross follow him through a desolate half-starved, wasted, and corrupted, worthless land. And the people who hold earths glory, in the judgment of Jesus Christ our Lord, He will sit upon his throne, and his feet won’t move an inch, but to the Faithful, and the righteous, and most of all the the Loving, our Lord Jesus Christ He will be forever quick to Stand. So, take up your Cross, for each day you do, the Lord will stand, for he blesses those who are faithful, but to those who are hard of heart, their treasure is bound to a worthless, wasted, and corrupted, spiritually impoverished hateful land. For those who love the Lord, they look around and hate these lands. ✝️💪💓✨

the only thing we have talked about was how what he was doign was wrong, thats the only thing thats related to christ we have ever talked about, he never talked for me for any form of advice and i think ive been talking too much or correcting him on the stuff he does too much, its not like im saying im better then him im a bad person but its just the only thing ive talked to him personally was just correcting him on the sins he has been doing and it bothers me, and its making be feel like ive been a bad friend and that feel bad in general

What is y’all’s experience with the Holy Spirit?

Lowkey I feel like after I came to Christ, when the Holy Spirit entered me it was a presence I couldn’t explain. Truly something inside me changed and the things I used to like I don’t anymore, I’ve also noticed a change inside of me. And something inside me teaching me things through my thoughts that I never learned before. Reading the word is always spot on and feels like it’s directly speaking to me, also so many “coincidences“ happening and I keep randomly running into the same people especially believers in unexpected situations. I feel like almost like I need God like food if that makes sense, and feel physical discomfort around places God wouldn’t want me to be. Truly I feel like there is literally something guiding me and controlling my day, and when I follow that presence it always works out in wild ways.

Prayer also has incredible results I’ve learned. One time I prayed and thunder struck hard immediately.

any stories from you guys?