Peace, I’m out.

Dear SI forum members, in the past few weeks or months I have noticed that many of the threads that I have either started or participated in have gotten a bit heated and they’ve been locked, and it seems it’s been at least partly due to my posts. I feel that there are quite a few here who would prefer to see me leave due to certain stances I take on certain issues. I feel that I should take all this as a queue that at this time it is not wise for me to continue to try to participate here. I’m thinking that maybe for me, as has been pointed out indirectly, participation in this forum is a distraction from God’s perfect will for me at this time.

Just want to say it’s been a blessing to interact here on and off for the past several years since I joined. I wish everyone well in the Lord.

Sincerely,
Oracio

I think you should reconsider. Otherwise who am I going to argue with?

All kidding aside, I appreciate your viewpoints. The body of Christ is like the light spectrum; it is made up of reds and purples and blues and all shades in between. But each need to be expressed to have the light God intended.

Oracio,

I also agree with Blaine and Todd for you to please reconsider as I value your input and you have nothing to be ashamed of concerning your convictions and faithfulness to what you know to be true.

I do bear witness with much of what you say and share. If there is ever a disagreement I would prefer to take it to you privately if the Lord would lead as sharing some things publicly does not edify but rather gender strife and division.

So do please reconsider and if you are indeed being led to leave I trust the Lord to go with you.

Brother Dave

Yeah Brother Oracio,
I concur with Todd,Blaine and David.... Tho I will say I have noticed you have been a bit dif over the past month or so and I'm not sure what it is about but I have been praying and lifting you up to the Father.

And if I don't get the chance at some later date,... your mom gave you one of the coolest names bro! I mean I kno this may sound silly to you but I just like saying it out loud:) I even told my wife!

Love you O.

Thank you so much all for all your encouragement. I guess I underestimated the amount of brethren who did not desire my departure. You guys almost convinced me to reconsider :).

JFW wrote:

I concur with Todd,Blaine and David.... Tho I will say I have noticed you have been a bit dif over the past month or so and I'm not sure what it is about but I have been praying and lifting you up to the Father.

Edit: thanks for the prayers!

And if I don't get the chance at some later date,... your mom gave you one of the coolest names bro! I mean I kno this may sound silly to you but I just like saying it out loud:) I even told my wife!

Brother Oracio,

Tho this may seem insensitive (don't mean it to be) and running the risk of coming off presumptuous and maybe even a lil crazy I'm gonna share what's on my heart for you- while this isn't a "Thus sayeth the Lord"... I do believe it's from Him and I hope the love and compassion I feel for you where you're at isn't lost in translation.

Bro, you are in a great place right now! The Lord was not surprised by this and is growing you/conforming you ever so much more into the image of His son. These distresses are most likely His.... and because you're willing to share in His sorrow you get the amazing privilege of seeing what He sees and feeling what He feels. Everyone wants to share in the joy of a friend but very few desire to share in their sorrow. I would say that if you went back in your memory and recalled your prayer life, you even asked for this. Maybe in a time when you were pressing in, hungry and thirsting after a deeper revelation of His righteousness you asked for more and if that's the case, dear brother rejoice! For the Lord has found you faithful and willing. I don't mean to pretend to know what's going on but I would say that what's round the corner is more glorious than you have probably imagined.

1 Peter 1:
5 who by God's power are protected through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.
6 This brings you great joy, although you may have to suffer for a short time in various trials.
7 Such trials show the proven character of your faith, which is much more valuable than gold - gold that is tested by fire, even though it is passing away - and will bring praise and glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.
8 You have not seen him, but you love him. You do not see him now but you believe in him, and so you rejoice with an indescribable and glorious joy,
9 because you are attaining the goal of your faith - the salvation of your souls

Thank you brother JFW for that encouragement, and thank you again Julius and everyone else. You brothers are too kind.

Okay, so lately I’ve been going through discouragement in my walk for a few different reasons, and I would appreciate the prayers of any brethren who feel led to pray for me regarding these things. One trial I’ve been experiencing is in my marriage. My wife and I have been married for almost 10 years and we have two little ones. In the past she has been unfaithful and has habitually lied about many things and has gotten drunk and has done some foolish and dangerous things while drunk which I do not want to post about in detail publicly for certain reasons. I am convinced that over the years she has been deceived by a certain kind of message within Christendom which says one can be a saved Christian while indulging in sin without repentance (without confessing and forsaking sin). Lately she has shown a bit more humility and trustworthiness than in the past and it seems that it’s possible that God has been working in her heart in conviction of sin, which is encouraging. But there have been many deep wounds in my heart and it’s still hard for me to fully trust her. So that’s one trial I’ve been going through. And that’s one reason why I am so deeply against that type of message which deceives many professing Christians into thinking they can be saved while holding on to their wicked ways. I have seen this message be the ruin of many precious souls that I personally know.

Another trial is in terms of fellowship with other like-minded believers. As I consider my surrounding area, I do not know of any churches nearby where I can safely say I would "fit in” without eventually being unwelcome once they know where I stand on certain doctrinal and practical issues. I see many churches that are compromising in many areas of both doctrine and practice which I deem to be crucial. Many churches teach this easy-believism message, and many are compromising with homosexuality and apostatizing. And many are more like a social club than a true church. I have tried doing house church in my home but that didn’t work for me either due to my wife not being fully supportive of it and due to not finding others who were really that interested. Currently I’ve been attending a Baptist church that is about 20 miles away in another city. It’s a pretty decent, solid church to me. However, I cannot get too close there because I hold to Amillennialism and Baptist Covenant Theology and they hold to Dispensational Premillennialism. Also, while this church is pretty solid in many ways, it too seems like another social club, as there is no evangelism team that goes out to reach the lost with the gospel but instead there are many programs within the building only.

Which brings me to another trial in the area of evangelism. In the past I’ve had quite a few like-minded believers I’ve been able to team up with to go out and share the gospel, but lately that has not been the case so I’ve had to go out alone a lot. Also, in getting out there I’ve run across many professing Christians who have been deceived by the easy-believism message, some who've protested against my sharing while being under the influence of alcohol.

Lately I was aware of a new superhero movie that came out which many Christians seem to be flocking to. This new movie has all the wicked things in it which I mentioned in the thread I started on that topic (nudity, cursing, blasphemy, etc). I first shared that post on my facebook page. I was aware of at least one professing Christian on my friends list that was planning on seeing that movie. This person also drinks beer and enjoys Satanic heavy metal music, and he works at a parachurch organization and attends an apostate emergent church. I have approached this person privately to warn and exhort him concerning his relationship with God but he has not heeded anything I’ve shared but has only gotten angry with me and has considered me a legalist. The sad thing is that some whom I consider to be true believers have come out in his defense and have too considered me to be a legalist for calling him out on those kinds of things. It seems that many true Christians would rather defend those who practice those kinds of things rather than defend those who take a stand against those things. So after I shared that post on my facebook I figured I’d also share it here on SI in case there might be any who read the forums who needed to hear that warning.

So the bottom line is that I’ve been going through sort of a dry season in my walk with discouragement in those and other areas. Thanks again for all the encouragement and thanks in advance for your prayers for me.

Ok yeah that is some heavy stuff and without going into a discourse, there is a definite parallel between what you are experiencing with your bride and what the Lord is experiencing with His bride (the church) so again you're getting to experience His grief as He also shares in/relates to yours.

Having said that I'd like to share with you what has been shared with me- this may seem a bit strange in the context of a public forum but I really hold fast to 1 John 1:7 so here it goes...

Brother Oracio, do you believe that God can fix this-
Yes or no?
(assuming you'd say yes)

Do you believe He will fix this if you ask Him to-
Yes or no?
(assuming you'd say you have been asking for years but yes Jesus says whatever we ask in His name His Father will do- we know it has to be his will but we also know the scriptures say He desires none to perish but all to come unto repentance so... Yes)

Now this is where it gets real,...

Do you believe He already has?
Jesus said, "IT IS FINISHED"
So if we believe that to be definitive then we will walk in faith regarding what has already been done and become partakers of His divine nature as we rest in the victory that He has already won for us:)
He says to speak things that aren't as tho they were,... And we (as husbands) are to wash and cleanse our wives with the word daily and present them to ourselves without spot or blemish. We are not moved by what we see but by faith in what we believe, and you my dear brother are a blood bought believer who is full of faith:)))
3 things come to mind as I'm writing this-
1. remember that she is His daughter first and your wife second (I struggle with this one)
2. She (and I mean this respectfully) doesn't sound like she feels worthy of love
3. I pray that He will teach you to love her the way she needs to be loved so she can know/believe and find comfort in it (I struggle here too)

So FTR I have a similar situation where my wife moved 9 hrs away taking 4 of our 6 kids and the dog with her, and at the time believed God was leading her to do this.... Needless to say this wrecked me as I live a very public life and there was nowhere to hide. But over the past couple of years the Lord has really grown me, taking me, breaking me, molding me- all whole showing Himself faithFULL and while I can def relate to your frustrations and at times I question the wisdom of it all,... But in the end it's not about me and what I get from her but who He is and what I can give for her. I really experienced a major shift when I quit asking Him to fix her and started asking Him to fix me~

Hope this helps bro, at least to know you're not alone in this-
Oh and yeah I was pronunciating your name wrong but down in Alabama we kinda do that to everything- but it's still a great name!

Thanks JFW, that does help a lot! Will definitely take it to heart; the part that sticks out he most is the one about asking the Lord to change me first.
And it's perfectly fine about the name pronunciation, just don't call me late for breakfast (I like breakfast more than dinner).