i need answers....

In order to get the fullest answer, i will go into details... although no names will be mentioned...I used to attend a church... a church where I was an affluent member, I was active in the youth group, i even preached at Fine Arts. I went off to college... but came up short, (partly my own doing in not working and saving money...)I returned from college devastated-ashamed, and went to a friends church twice to catch up, (I was gone for a month and a half...)and people at my "home church" adopted tones with me and said I should go to one church and one church only.Eventually I got a fulltime job housekeeping at a nursing home... it requires that I work on every other Sunday... (people need care on the weekends too...)The Sundays I'm off I attend this other church of a different denomination...Am I in the wrong scripturally?I dont want opinions I want answers... heartfelt scriptural advice...

hi prodigalchadAnd being let go, they went to their own company, and reported all that the chief priests and elders had said unto them. (Act 4:23 KJV)I think that much more important than 'going to church' is 'being part of one'. God sets the solitary in families and for most people there is a particular setting in which you will flourish and be fruitful. Sometimes such places are not comfortable, but there is usually a sense of 'belonging'; this is 'my own company'. We usually have a company of God's people which is 'my own place'.If the time comes, and it often does, for God to set you in a different company endeavour to leave the first 'company' from the centre rather than dropping off the fringe. If you really feel you should be elsewhere get the first 'company' to pray for you. It ought to be possible for you to visit the earlier company as a welcome friend rather than an embarassed 'prodigal'.Spurgeon once said the 'tree which is being regulary transplanted will not a need a barn for its fruit'. He was a wise man, I think.I know it is not always possible to enjoy these things but, as far as it lies in you, be at peace with all men.

Hello ...chad. I know that you don't need opinions. None of us do. We need to know what God thinks. I pray that my answer to your question comes from the heart of God. First, the truth is, the church is not a place, it is people. The church is made up of the Body of Christ. I had a friend tell me not too long ago, "You can find just as many Christians at Walmart as you can in any given church." In other words, they are everywhere, but there aren't alot of them. Oh sure, there are millions upon millions who call themselves "Christian", but they are headed for hell just like the rest of the world. They just don't know it, yet. I am basically in the same boat you are in. I'm not technically even in any church right now. I go to church often. I just don't always go to the same one. In fact, I believe God is telling me not to go to church for the next year. Here's why: You can go to church every time the door is open and still not know God. In fact, being so busy with all this "religion" can keep us from truly knowing God. Jesus said, "only one thing is needful". Do you know what the "one thing" is? It is to sit at his feet and learn from him. I guarantee you, if you get alone with God and really, earnestly seek him, you will find him. And when you get to know him, he won't steer you wrong. ;-) Take time to ask God what he thinks. It really doesn't matter what any of us think, cause if we don't think like God thinks, we're wrong. God, reveal yourself to this one, in Jesus name.Just let me say, when you do know God, you will not be satisfied to sit at home alone. You will be compelled to find others who love him as you do. You will be compelled to reach out to the lost and hurting in this world. You will long to worship corporately. But... you can't fake really knowing God to someone who really knows him. You can only fake it with others who are faking it.

Dian (spitfire)- AMEN!Ron (philologos) amen too, but I could just understand Dian's language a little better :-D In His love, Chanin

let us draw near with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful; and let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds, not forsaking our own assembling together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another; and all the more as you see the day drawing near. (Heb 10:22-25 NASB)Wesley’s motive never eludes us. In his early manhood, after being greatly affected by Jeremy Taylor’s Holy Living and Dying and the Imitatio Christi, and by Law’s Serious Call and Christian Perfection, he met “a serious man” who said to him, “Sir, you wish to serve God and go to heaven. Remember you cannot serve Him alone. You must therefore find companions or make them. The Bible knows nothing of solitary religion.”

"Church-hopping" is what your church is openly or secretly accusing you of, if i read between the lines correctly. I do not think that you are guilty of that at all. Church-hopping is when someone keeps going from one church to another, leaving whenever they fear having to be accountable to other believers, or when the preaching convicts them, or when they get offended by some insignificant slight.As long as the other church you're going to is a Bible-believing church and you feel that God is leading you to stay there, just stay. There is nothing that says you must stay at the other church. In fact, please don't stay at the other church simply because the people there say you should. You have to follow what God is telling you.As far as working Sundays, I am a nurse and I completely understand where you're coming from. I have had people tell me before, "we'll pray for you that you won't have to work Sundays anymore." I thought that was kind of ridiculous because people have babies (I'm a labor and delivery nurse) every day of the week. If I didn't work my Sundays then someone else would be missing church too. I have been at my job long enough now that I usually can work Saturdays instead of Sundays. My husband works in the ER and he has to work alot of Sundays. We go to Bible Study during the week usually, though. It is important to get your food from somewhere. That is how Sermonindex has been such a blessing to me. I download sermons and listen to them when I have to miss church.Phebe

Matthew 12:1-13 1 At that time Jesus passed through the grainfields on the Sabbath. His disciples were hungry and began to pick and eat some heads of grain. 2 But when the Pharisees saw it, they said to Him, "Look, Your disciples are doing what is not lawful to do on the Sabbath!" 3 He said to them, "Haven't you read what David did when he was hungry, and those who were with him-- 4 how he entered the house of God, and they ate the sacred bread, which is not lawful for him or for those with him to eat, but only for the priests? 5 Or haven't you read in the law that on Sabbath days the priests in the temple violate the Sabbath and are guiltless? 6 But I tell you that something greater than the temple is here! 7 If you had known what this means: I desire mercy and not sacrifice , you would not have condemned the guiltless. 8 For the Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath." 9 Moving on from there, He entered their synagogue. 10 There He saw a man who had a paralyzed hand. And in order to accuse Him they asked Him, "Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?" 11 But He said to them, "What man among you, if he had a sheep that fell into a pit on the Sabbath, wouldn't take hold of it and lift it out? 12 A man is worth far more than a sheep, so it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath." 13 Then He told the man, "Stretch out your hand." So he stretched it out, and it was restored, as good as the other.