Hook, Line and Sinker: chapter 3

I stuck it out with the Catholic Church for two years after my salvation. After my life changing experience with God, the Catholic services no longer struck me as interesting, pious or holy but rather dry and rote. I had been taught by my precious mother that we were part of the one true church started by Peter himself.  However, the Catholic Church I had experienced was not anything like the church accounted for in Acts and although Peter was a paramount part of this Biblical model, something wasn't lining up. I very much wanted to believe my mom so I talked to the priests about my concerns. I never received an answer that came remotely close to answering my questions. To top it off, the priests were clearly annoyed that I would ask such questions. I became increasingly indignant with the Catholic Church for not meeting my needs and not answering my questions adequately.  

It broke my heart to break my parent’s hearts but I had to leave the church and find my own spiritual way.   I felt like a withering grape on the vine.  I had an overwhelming drive to know more about God and His Word. It was in my second year of college, when I was nineteen years old, I blindly skipped off into Christendom without a map.  I wandered from this church to that church for awhile but “Lively Church” was where my happy-go-lucky skipping finally landed me.  The only thing that I knew for sure about this place was that they did believe in speaking in tongues.  This was enough for me.

I continued going to Lively Church where the “prophetess” had visited early in 1987.  It was the excitement and the energy of the place that attracted me.  It seemed like a lot of fun.  I diligently listened to the pastor’s teaching.  At first, most of the notions he presented were difficult for me to grasp.  Nonetheless, I found his concepts captivating and my ravishing hunger seemed to be satisfied.   What I also found to be just as striking as the pastor’s teaching was the rich fellowship of fellow college students who attended the church as well.  I found the content of their numerous campus discussions to be exhilarating.  It did not take long for the Lively Church concepts to burrow deep into my thinking.  To this day I can remember these campus conversations concerning wealth, our authority over sickness, the power of the spoken word, our rights and privileges as God’s children and the principals of faith.  Every chance we fellow Lively Church goers had, we buckled down to our theological discussions.  Being the novice that I was, I was content, at first, to listen, taking in and soaking up the new information whenever I could. They never argued but they sure did laugh a lot.  Eventually it dawned on me that the laughter was due to their giddy astonishment about how much Christians could and should have.  Slowly but surely I did involve myself in the conversations.  It all began to make sense to me and it seemed to fit into what I had read so far in the Bible.  

Looking back I can say with all assurance that a very few good things came from my time with these believers.   Among the few things that was good was that I started praying much more by myself and with other believers. An upperclassman named “Michelle” had befriended me. She and I hung out together regularly.  She taught me the “Way”.   We alternately took turns meeting each morning at six in our dorm rooms to pray for an hour.

 Praying was the end of her good influence on me, however. One particular day stands out in my memory.  Michelle and I were on an errand to water some plants at a friend’s house that was out of town.   One of the plants was dying. Rather loudly, Michelle proclaimed to the plant "live in Jesus’ Name!” After I got over my initial fright I joined in her excitement over the authority we thought sure was ours for the taking.  We just knew that the plant would live. We talked all the way home about the power we have in our tongue over life and death. Both of us questioned why we didn’t see more Christians speaking in such a manner to reflect this truth. We concluded that we were enlightened but other believers were not. I think we both considered, from that moment on, that it was our primary objective to convert as many people as we could to this form of Christianity.  We never knew if the plant lived or died. 

I submerged myself in the new found role of the illuminated believer. I walked around campus all smiles unafraid to voice my love and praise for Jesus. I truly was in love with Jesus. Why didn’t other believers exclaim their love for Him as boisterously as I did?  I boldly voiced what I confidently held as truth at the IVCF meetings, which I still visited on occasion. One can only imagine the response I received there.  And it was these responses which caused me to completely stop attending these meetings. I had no intent to hurt, offend, or anger my other Christian friends.  I was moving forward in my faith in the best way I knew how.  In the long run it mattered little what others thought of me or what I vocalized; I was set on my fresh course in life. No one could discourage me.

Every week the college church group met for home prayer meetings at different ladies homes. The meetings were attended by just us college kids and a few ladies. I wasn’t the only one who thought that these meetings were intoxicating.  My church friends and I went regularly. I looked forward to these so much that I would daydream about what might happen.  First, we would spend some time in worship. The emotion I felt during worship was intense. Then we would pray.  The praying didn’t seem to last very long. It usually ended abruptly because one of the matronly ladies had a prophetic word or a vision she wanted to share. The supernatural essence of these meetings greatly appealed to me.  I never questioned what happened there. We rarely read the Bible at these meetings and I never protested that either.  I read the Bible at home and it was referred to in church. That was enough for me. I inherently trusted these people.  I had no reason not to.  They appeared to care about me.  Not knowing any better I received with a whole heart. 

 I faithfully attended Lively Church and the prayer meetings for six months.  In these six months I adopted beliefs that would affect my life profoundly for years to come.  If anyone had asked me to write a paper on what I believed at the end of those six months, I doubt I could have filled half of a page.  I had strong ideas and I could spit out jargon like nobodies business but I had no idea what was deeply embedded in these beliefs.    I could quote scriptures that had been quoted to me.  I could repeat key teachings of the men, Kenneth Copeland, Charles Capps and Kenneth Hagin; not grasping the essence of the teaching itself.  I had never heard of the Word of Faith movement but I was accepting its most prominent doctrines.   I was just like the fish who found what it thought to be a real juicy meal.  Like the unaware fish, I listened; I swallowed, hook, line and sinker.