Has a Christian essentially DENIED the faith if they're constantly jerks to others?

[Patrick1966]

Do interactions cause others to get angry?
Yes. I experienced on forums others getting so angry they could not respond and had to go away for days to calm down.

Let me explain. Some folk grow up in a world of rules which they follow to the letter, or as best they can. An incident happens in their life and this group to which they were faithful throws them out. The pain and anger is deep and life changing. Over time they pick themselves up and make a new life and belief system which answers their pain and anger, painting their past friends as enemies and their beliefs as the worst thing in the whole world.

Along comes me. A few sentences and out pours this emotional vitriol. There is nothing I can say or do which can unpick this because it is about me becoming their past hated group and so I must die.

So what is the problem? Clearly it is the hurt and pain and whatever happened and unpicking this from their past.
I knew a good christian friend of mine who hated catholics from his youth. It took 6 years of walking with Jesus before he finally could see people who were catholics as people with their lives mixed up as they were, like everyone else and without the hatred.

So I know how difficult this can be, and how I am an innocent victim of this unresolved pain and anger. But this is where Jesus stood, before Pilate and the rulers of Jerusalem. Their pain and anger was aimed at Him and He forgave them because they did not know what they were doing. And likewise we, when the light is switched on, see the anger launched on us talking about loving God and others, has nothing to do with our words but their hurt and sin and closed mind and so likewise can forgive them because they do not know what they are doing.

God bless you

Yea? Take this!

 

[Jay Ross]

Yea? Take this!

Said one who, by their responses to others is considered by them to be a jerk in no small measure.

This sort of rebuttal is in my opinion demeaning to all of the other members except for his friend who came with him.

 

[WalkInLight]

Said one who, by their responses to others is considered by them to be a jerk in no small measure.

This sort of rebuttal is in my opinion demeaning to all of the other members except for his friend who came with him.

I am a jerk, the Lord loves me and I am working on it.
I realised often I do not look in the mirror enough to work out what I am saying and how it is coming across.

Often making others be put right, is just my own self delusion showing and I am just working through my own beliefs.

A guy in our church has some serious behaviour problems and loves to help because they have the solution.
Another fellow I was with once with found this behaviour really annoying. Personally if someone is actually able to help, Amen.
But some take this help as a criticism, you think you know you can help but I have one better.

So those who make you feel small, are often the small man trying to be something they are not.

I once tried to defend one thread commentator against an emotional manipulator who knew instinctively to take an open
and honest response and turn it into a knock down. In a few words they could take someone out. To my mind this was
cruel and wrong, and I pointed this out. I then became their enemy, and the debate ensued for years.

Sadly it was their natural defence mechanism, which I was never sure got any proper light on it.
Mine was discussing and working through things, which may be equally as difficult.

All I know in the end, if I can speak from a place of peace in Christ, probably I am saying something in love.
God bless you

 

[WalkInLight]

Jerks

Before we met Christ we were all jerks.
But Jesus loved us, and when we opened up our hearts and let Him in, our need to be a jerk started to work out, and
slowly we have become people who love, share and encourage.

I know I used to be very sarcastic and used this to provoke responses and test others out.
It was a way of defending my heart and my deep need to be accepted and loved.
After growing up in a family who did not know how to love from the heart, I was literally alone.
So lost were my family they thought love was a joke and you just played along.

When I was getting engaged to my girl friend a school friend invited me round to his house and
suggested he knew his lodger better than I knew my girlfriend. I should have laughed at him and
said his wife should divorce him on the spot if this was the case, but he thought he knew me, the closed
off shut down individual that I showed in the past.

Inside though I loved deeply and wondered why others did not know love and how glorious it was.
As a youngster I only knew from a distance this precious jewel worth more than my life, but I knew Jesus
held the answer. After 35 years I can declare, love works, and in Jesus His freedom is life itself.

But finding this path is hard and with Jesus it changes you.
So where each Jerk is on their path, I do not know, but Jesus says I should love them all, because each
one is just like me.

God bless you

 

[WalkInLight]

I sometimes forget myself and may be less-than-kind to another and then come on here and discuss the word of God. Yes, I am a hypocrite. And that's why I posted, what good is it to know the word but then not follow it?

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I have some interesting experiences on this. I shared love with fellow believers and was told this was just to make believers feel
guilty and condemned so was satanic. In their particular theology and emotional place, they were forgiven while sinning,
and sinning was forgiven in Jesus even if committed, and their faith meant they were accepted in Jesus, and only satan
would condemn them into unbelief that their behaviour was not acceptable to God. So no need for repentance or change
of behaviour or attitude.

I obviously was hurt and taken aback. I had never come across this line of reasoning.
What became clear to me is actually how non-christian it was. One believer took it upon themselves to sin against me and lie
to provoke a sinful response to show me I was a hypocrite who had no revelation or reality in Christ.

The belief system was totally nihilistic, ie no action performed by people matters only their faith position in Christ.
Why this makes me say this is the opposite of Jesus and the gospel is the gospel is shown by His people showing love
one to another and victory over sin and death is the claim of Jesus for His followers. If you abandon this you create
another faith and belief system.

So if I was transformed by love and brought to a different place by Jesus, they were wrong, because what they claimed
as powerless was actually real. It took quite some time to work this through, step by step.

After discovering their theology and working it through, I tried some very sarcastic insights, robots in heaven, a robe on
a rotten corpse, a ticket bought which can never be cashed, a schizophrenic split personality between the sinful flesh
and perfect spirit. Sadly their theology meant they could be themselves and know acceptance but never any bad
conscience for sin or hurt they create.

Was I wrong to explore and point these realities out? To say this took a long time, is no joke.
What we are seeing in US politics is partly the fruit of their theology and insanity.

And sadly around 50% of certain Christian forums was populated by such theology and people

God bless you