I have never felt convicted to fall down at an alter call (Slain in the Spirit) or to speak in tongues (glossolalia). I suppose it was easy for me to overlook all last year since the speaking in tongues at church was neither loud, nor long. I figured if people around me felt convicted to do so, fine, and if the pastor did it fine, it didn't really affect me.
Last week I went to Ladies Bible Study and they're studying "Randy Clark's School of Healing and Impartation" that night. Impartation is when someone supernaturally receives a word, thought, feeling, vision about someone else's health. They share their word, thought, feeling, vision given to them through the Holy Spirit and if you think it's you they're talking about, you say so. If you get healed you, in the audience, wave one or two arms depending upon how healed you feel, then the person up front who gave the word has an idea whether or not their Holy Spirit imparted word, thought, feeling, vision affected someone. Randy Clark says when you pray for someone far away you never know if the prayer has any effect. What a safe way to pray, he says. I want to say for the record, that I don't see it that way at all.
We ladies tried it in our own small group and suffice to say while I had reservations about it, at the same time it was a heady experience. Hmmmm. Let me see what phrase comes to my mind right now. Could it be "instant gratification?" And as I watched the video I was thinking it reminded me of E.S.T. Remember EST back in the mid-80s? I went to one meeting and they told you to go get $400.00 and sign up. No, they said sign up for $400.00 then use the E.S.T. power to attract that money to yourself! They'll just take you to court if you don't actually pay. It was really big at the time. I told my friend forget it. I was single and raising my son by myself and no amount of E.S.T. power was going to attract $400.00 to me. I wish.
Then, last Sunday there was guest speaker, a pastor from Texas, of whom also is quite the real estate mogul. His church has grown, his prayers for abundant housing in the town answered, and the land God told him to purchase has resold for multi-millions. He gave an alter call for anyone to come up who wants to experience financial prosperity such as he has. This means he says a prayer over everyone and confers, anoints, or imparts, potential $$$ success upon those believers. I was one of the few who didn't go up to get some. Surely, I do not wish to be poor, but to have enough is all I need. I think one can flourish without a big bank account. I am not against immense economic success for anyone. The pastor can have a fleet of Hummers for all I care, and if he's worked for it he deserves it. It's just not one of the things I seek.
My reservations built up till finally I had to write my people and get some input. A person needs some balance, a solid place from which to branch out. I was lost for a minute, but nobody let me down. I must be very rich with Christian women friends. And next I hunkered down with my Bible.
Well, I have to write more later. My eyes are killing me. We drove to Cruces today and we were gone from 3:15pm till 9:30pm. The upshot is I'm afraid I gotta change churches. I like it there though and I've grown so much there. 'Tis sad I should have to leave. Maybe they're changing direction now and that's why none of this came up to me last year. Sigh. I still love Jesus and I like being a Christian. The religion part proves to be a bit thorny however.
