Journey Through Conversion

7/12/12

I've been wanting to share my story of how my conversion to a Torah lifestyle has come about.  I have officially converted but that is not the end of the story.  One thing I have learned from studying Torah is more knowledge leads to more questions.   This is a wonderful thing.  Why?  Because it allows for growth.  When we are squelched from asking questions our curiosity is diminished and we lose interest all together.  When we are told "just because" we forego a beautiful heritage that we can learn from.

I grew up in a household that was Christian--actually secular Christian if that is a term.  I asked what we were and was told Protestant.  Ok.  I was an only child who was sent to the local Presbyterian Church for Sunday School.  Typically I didn't want to go, and especially did not want to dress up while everyone else wore jeans (thanks Mom).  I will say I grew up in a loving home, full of values and morals-but not religious.

I was baptized when I was 12 (not an infant) in my Grandparents Methodist Church because my mom and dad wanted me to understand what I was doing.  I had water sprinkled on my head and had a party afterwards with cards full of money.  If I had to memorize Hebrew instead of being sprinkled I would say it was a bat mitzvah-lol.

My first question came shortly after this.  If we believe in God, and Jews believe in God then why don't we get along?  Why a church and a synagogue?

A few years later a friend invited me to a baptist church youth group and I went.  It was fun.  I met a boy. I continued to go.  We went on a retreat and I was presented with the message of salvation (blood of the lamb etc...) I remember one night in particular during the retreat.  They gave the salvation message and invited us to accept J-s-s as our savior.  People got up and went up front.  Then the man leading this event said now we have eternal life and can never be separated from God.  No matter what we do we can not lose salvation.  Then he said imagine if you had died yesterday.  gasp.  eternal hell without God.  At the time I was overcome with the shock factor.  Today I look back at it and see it as a scare tactic!  They then said we were not good in and of ourselves, that only J-s-s who now lives inside of us is good.  A great question at this time would've been: what about all of those wonderful people out there who do not believe in J-s-s, self sacrificing mothers and fathers, doctors and teachers, firefighters and volunteers who may never heard this message?  They are going to this place called Hell all because they didnt accept J-s-s as their savior?  Our actions don't matter?   Another good question.

Time moved on and I got engaged to this boy in the youth group, married, had children and was very happy.  Still am.  However, there has been a huge paradigm shift in how we live and raise our kids.

As fate would have it, this guy I married was Jewish (yes, I knew this all along but it didn't mean anything at the time), messianic was the term for those who are Jewish and believe in J-s-s, back then they called them Hebrew Christians (a term I rarely here now) or a completed Jew.

Time went on, and on, we had 3 boys and I was pregnant with our fourth child.  Hubby was getting more interested in his Jewishness and started attending a messianic-dare I say-synagogue.  He was gone for most of the day on Saturday and I was home pregnant with 3 boys (yeah,ok).  He would come home so happy, he was now connecting to his Jewish roots.  How could I begrudge this.  He would devote the remainder of the day to me and the boys.  He convinced me to come with him to one of the services, he met some people he wanted me to meet.  To clinch the deal he promised me lunch afterwards-ok, girls really do want to have lunch-so off we went.

This Protestant girl turned baptist (at least I went to a baptist church) felt she had landed on Mars.  Shofars blowing, prayers in a foreign language, songs in a foreign language, prayer shawls, kip pas--what is all of this?  I laugh now when I think back to this day, to how bizarre it seemed.  I think I would have this reaction if I were to walk into a church today-lol.

We did meet some awesome people who have become good friends of ours to this day-we of course have both left this "synagogue".

So, how did we transition over from Messianic to a more traditional Jewish, torah centered life?  What was it like to leave the church?  To denounce a faith that I thought I was so sure of (or was I)?  This will be part 2-so stay tuned!


7/23

When you become a born again christian you are accepting the idea that someone died for you, a sacrifice in your place, because you are not good enough to repent on your own for anything you may do wrong in your life.  They even go so far as to say we are all born this way, therefore everyone needs this one and only salvation play if you want to get into Heaven.   I have come to discover over the years the profile of those who actually become "born again".  Basically it consists of those who are depressed, those who are newly divorced, and young children.  It is the first 2 groups who are looking for a fresh start, this seems to provide them with that new beginning.  Young children trust adults, plain and simple.  Yet, there is another group-the group I belonged to.  Teenagers.  Teenagers invited on church retreats and to youth groups to be in a friendly, safe (free from drinking,drugs etc...) environment.  In my case I loved volleyball and was pretty good at it.  I went on Friday night to volleyball night.  This led to movie night, dinners, Sunday School, and retreats.  We were now a group of friends.  When the salvation message was presented to me I was touched, felt how awesome someone would die for me, also felt I had nothing to lose.  I think this is basically how many teens feel who are/were in my position.  What can it hurt?  If its not real we haven't lost anything.  But, if it is real, we are good to go.   We were told to spread the message.  My family was upset with me, I became narrow minded in my thinking (this is the only way to Heaven).  The only problem is...people who are narrow minded do not realize they are narrow minded.  oy vey.

I can't speak for every born again christian but for me, I sometimes wondered if my salvation took.  There would be revivals etc..and I would pray for salvation again...and again...just in case.  Fast forward a few years and the emotions of my experience began to fade more and more.  Even revivals did not help.  I wasn't feeling this overwhelming love for the one who they say died for me.  I remember vividly asking G-d one day (I am now married with 3 kids and 1 on the way) to please show me what He wants from me.  Little did I know my husband was doing the same thing.  He is a born Jew, and his questions were more geared towards his Jewish roots, his heritage.  This was foreign to me so I wasn't prepared for the changes that were coming.

He started studying the Torah.  He shared with me what he was learning.  I couldn't disagree with him. He started wearing tzitzits as it says to do in the Torah.  He also wore them to church and to his deacon meetings.  Yes, he was a deacon in a baptist church, wearing a kippah and tzitzits.  Oh and prayer shawl during services, did I mention this?  Some people thought it was neat.   After all we were friends with a couple who were with Jews for J-s-s, and they would come to church and be Jewish believers in messiah.  My husband was Jewish so it only made sense.  They also wanted him to join the organization and he said he didn't feel right doing it.

One day Chosen People Ministries came and my husband was friends with the man who was representing them-he may have been the president of the organization or something.  Now this is where it gets interesting.  We invited Mitch over for lunch after services.  My husband showed an interest in teaching people about Torah, Mitch suggested a home study group.  Invite people over to our home.  This sounded interesting.  We had it put in the bulletin at church that we would have Friday night bible studies after candle lighting to mark the Jewish Sabbath.  We knew some people were interested in the messianic teachings so this sounded like a good time to do it.  Also, kids club was going on at church so, drop the kids off and come around the corner to our house.

We lit one candle, sat at the table and waited.  No one came.  We were not discouraged.  Eventually we stopped advertising in the bulletin.  We had some people show up once or twice, we did pot luck dinners, barbecues etc....then we had some regulars.  In the end we had 3 regular people besides us, and some occasional drop ins.  We were now meeting on Saturday afternoons, had lunch and spent the say learning Torah and the New Testament.  What was nice about this group was we all felt comfortable together, we all asked questions.  We loved to learn.  Sounds like utopia.  However, in all of this love of learning, we discovered some of us were starting to question the whole J-s-s is salvation, J-s-s is G-d idea.

Now, my husband already dismissed the J-s-s notion but did not say anything.  He wanted us to come to it on our own, and some of us did and some of us did not.  Our perfect little group disbanded.  I have come to realize many messianic groups end up this way, dividing because some people realize christian born again theology is not what they thought.



7/24

During this time in our lives my husband lost his job.  Yes, for 3 years we struggled, and we were provided for.  When you ask G-d to show you something, He will, and He will give you the time to do it as well-lol.  Without a full time job my husband had the time to study and research.  He wanted to know the role Torah should play in our lives.  I will not lie.  It was scary for me at first.  My husband was changing before my eyes, and although I knew he was right in what he was learning/doing, I was not sure I was ready for this.  How would we raise our kids, what holidays would we celebrate, what about church?

One day hubby says he can't eat pork or shellfish anymore.  I'm ok with not eating pork but shellfish?  Really?  Lobster, shrimp, mussels?  Seriously?  Ok.  Its not like we ate these on a daily basis but we live by the ocean, its kind of a staple around here at the few restaurants we have.  Some time went by and I was listening to the radio.  I am sorry I did not write down the revelations I was given, but there were 3 of them.  This was all on my way to my ob/gyn appt.  By the time I got to the doctors office I called my husband and said no more pork or shellfish.  He couldn't believe his ears.  I didn't know about the slaughtering process yet, but that came later.

I want to share some of the scriptures that put our christian beliefs into question.  Before I do that though, I want to share about the day I left the church.  Through this time period my husband kept asking the pastor different questions re: the bible.  The answers were mostly that these were gray areas, or they were seemingly shallow answers.  My last day at the church I felt like a complete stranger there.    

I didn't share there beliefs in exactly the same way, I would be seen as lost or a traitor.  All I knew was now slipping away from me.  It was hurting so badly inside, yet I knew it had to be done.  I handed my resignation in, and it was over.  The people who were my family for so many years were not there anymore.  It was in many way a rough transition.