John Chan
#0
[babble alert...]
One thing I\'ve noticed about becoming Orthodox, is that much of what I had thought was important to the Christian life when I was Protestant is downplayed, and much of what I had overlooked is now prominent.
I used to think that fasting and prayer rules were rigid and confining. I used to think that telling my story, my personal experience and \'testimony\' was a good thing to do.
I no longer pray spontaneously, and when I find myself humming a praise chorus, I sometimes feel guilty. I admit that when I want to talk of something that I have learned recently, I pause to consider if I\'m feeding pride - and then I decide to keep silent because it seems safer.
Surely there must be a balance somewhere that I haven\'t found yet. Or maybe I shouldn\'t have said something about it.
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balance indeed!
I haven\'t been orthodox very long... only since 2004... and I admit that I wasn\'t devouring booksout orthodoxy prior to converting either... just a few here and there that my spiritual father recommended... maybe it\'s because I didn\'t come from protestantism, but atheism...
but I certainly (unfortunately) found that my newfound moral footing gave me a firm stance to enter into political discussions... I voted... once... for the guy many would say is \"the wrong guy\"... nothing much came of it - despite the teeth clenching arguments.. and I came to realize that my opinion doesn\'t need to be so vocal... that being so vocal had me headed to confession on a weekly basis to confess pride, anger frustration, impatience, yadda yadda yadda
after having overcome the standard convert zealousy, I really came to appreciate something I had read... maybe it was desert fathers... maybe lives of ___ saint... maybe it was a fortune cookie - \"God gave you 2 ears and only 1 mouth... He must have intended for you to listen twice as much as you talk.\" (unfortunately, applying the same logic, in this computer age, we have 10 fingers to condemn ourselves with!!)
it\'s funny... I see some forum posts sometimes.. and I will write big long responses... and then come to myself and say \"ya know... who am I?\" and just close the browser... maybe this is one of those posts that I should have done so! haha
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