Alpha is my new life
Since I have nothing to complain or talk about, I'd like to enlighten the very little audience I do have, on Alpha. The basics of Alpha are on the church website which I designed myself (with my "You can BS html too!" self-written book), but I'll tell you more here if you're too lazy to check this page out.
First, What is Alpha? It's a 10 week course, with dinner (have to have the food!) and small group discussions on investigating Christianity. It answers all the questions some might think are too dumb to ask, but wonder anyway. "Who Is Jesus" "What is the Holy Spirit" "How to Read the Bible" "How can I be sure of my faith?" "How can I make the most of the rest of my life?", etc. It's not school and it's not a boring weekly bible study either, trust me. The best way that I can describe it is to tell you this: My atheist turned agnostic husband went along to the first dinner and discussion because he was searching for some answers. He didn't find those answers yet, but decided to keep going, and somehow I got sucked into it the third week along (probably because they served dinner). Even though halfway through he still wasn't sure of anything because of "all the hypocrisy of Christians," he continued to go and by the end of the course not only became a Christian, but is now helping to run the Alpha course at our own church and playing guitar in the church's contemporary service. He reads the bible every night, and told me that his experience of finding God was a feeling of "relief." To hear that coming from my very analytical, logical and science-minded husband is a huge deal.
However, I can't really tell you his entire experience, everything is pretty personal. After all, what a person usually finds after the course is that they for once in their life, have an actual personal relationship with Jesus Christ. Not the pray and hope something happens relationship, but the relationship that involves such trust and confidence, that the person is able to feel peace and be free of anxiety when bad moments occur. What I can tell you is my own experience, but since the American attention-span is as short as my manx cat's tail, I'll try my best to condense it.
I hate to sound like an infomercial for Alpha, and I especially hate to sound like one of those "jesus freaks" found on street corners shouting into megaphones just who is going to hell and such. I don't like those people either, and I don't like to be interrupted in the grocery store by someone who wants to preach the gospel to me. I'm not one of those people. I'm a 25 year old big kid who wishes her Daddy could still walk on water, and her Mommy could still make everything better with a kiss and a bowl of ice cream. I can't say that I spent my entire life being an atheist, but I was pretty agnostic for a better part of it, although I went to church and grew up in an Episcopal school. I could recite the lord's prayer in latin frontwards and backwards while standing on one foot, but for years I couldn't tell you what "temptation" meant.
I'll sum it up like this: Before Alpha - I had been going to church regularly for a year. I was diagnosed with severe depression, had a husband who couldn't live in the same country as me, and had a worthless college degree from a college that nobody in Louisiana knew existed (this college). I prayed, I thought I had gotten a pretty good understanding of God, and wanted my husband to be Christian. But I never touched a bible. I thought that was someone else's fictional history book that makes normal people just go nuts when they read it.
During Alpha - The best description I can tell you is that I felt loved. The basis of Alpha is to learn and discuss through the friendships you make with the others in your small group, and I did just that. These weren't people I'd normally hang out with, all of them were old enough to be my parents, and none of them had probably even considered voting for Gore four years ago. I had the best time on the course and looked forward to every Wednesday evening where I'd get a free dinner, good conversation with my group, I'd learn something and every now and then, I'd feel comfortable to ask one of my dumb questions. "So just what is the difference between Jesus and the Holy Ghost?" I made friends with these people, and learned incredibly valuable things through their life experiences.
After Alpha - I've finally understood just what the Bible has to do with all of this. It's not just a book, or just a history book for some. I can finally see it as my "owner's manual" for myself and my relationship with God. Not only that, it's no longer boring to me. I'm reading it, and I'm actually wanting to read more. It's amazing, I've tried reading it before and it was always just another boring story I didn't want to know. And this relationship with God thing, it's not about looking up and asking for help anymore. It's about feeling the presence all around me and in me, and just saying "thank you", "please" and "if that's what you want, this is what I'll do." It's even better than my imaginary friend from childhood, Bertha Louise May. I have two best friends in my heart. God and my husband. And it has brought my husband and I closer together now that we can share this relationship together.
It's not that I think everyone needs help. There are those who believe in God, but say that they don't need to go to church, or need to read the bible; and there are those who believe there is something, but that they shouldn't have to believe in something so hypocritical. People can live their entire lives without this relationship, and they might be fine. However, I'm forever grateful that I did Alpha. The biggest difference would probably be that I actually do feel that I can achieve fulfillment without buying something. I make mistakes with my money all the time. I just KNEW that the digital camera would be all I ever wanted and would make my life complete. I just KNOW that being skinny will be the end all to my disappointing life. I just KNEW that landing that british husband would make me whole. That's not where I found it. I found it after Alpha, when Hubby and I were discussing part of a gospel we had read, and immediately right there I prayed a "thank you for my husband" prayer that I do probably twenty times a day, and I felt such incredible peace and love, like a ghost wearing heated velvet bear-hugging me. That's my fulfillment.
Anyway, in case you're interested in doing something similar to Alpha or want to know more about it, go to www.alphausa.org and find out where courses are near you. There are hundreds of thousands of courses around the country and the world. And for you other Anglophiles - a lot of the course has to do with listening to lectures in a british accent. How's that for entertainment?
"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest." Matthew 11:28
Since I have nothing to complain or talk about, I'd like to enlighten the very little audience I do have, on Alpha. The basics of Alpha are on the church website which I designed myself (with my "You can BS html too!" self-written book), but I'll tell you more here if you're too lazy to check this page out.
First, What is Alpha? It's a 10 week course, with dinner (have to have the food!) and small group discussions on investigating Christianity. It answers all the questions some might think are too dumb to ask, but wonder anyway. "Who Is Jesus" "What is the Holy Spirit" "How to Read the Bible" "How can I be sure of my faith?" "How can I make the most of the rest of my life?", etc. It's not school and it's not a boring weekly bible study either, trust me. The best way that I can describe it is to tell you this: My atheist turned agnostic husband went along to the first dinner and discussion because he was searching for some answers. He didn't find those answers yet, but decided to keep going, and somehow I got sucked into it the third week along (probably because they served dinner). Even though halfway through he still wasn't sure of anything because of "all the hypocrisy of Christians," he continued to go and by the end of the course not only became a Christian, but is now helping to run the Alpha course at our own church and playing guitar in the church's contemporary service. He reads the bible every night, and told me that his experience of finding God was a feeling of "relief." To hear that coming from my very analytical, logical and science-minded husband is a huge deal.
However, I can't really tell you his entire experience, everything is pretty personal. After all, what a person usually finds after the course is that they for once in their life, have an actual personal relationship with Jesus Christ. Not the pray and hope something happens relationship, but the relationship that involves such trust and confidence, that the person is able to feel peace and be free of anxiety when bad moments occur. What I can tell you is my own experience, but since the American attention-span is as short as my manx cat's tail, I'll try my best to condense it.
I hate to sound like an infomercial for Alpha, and I especially hate to sound like one of those "jesus freaks" found on street corners shouting into megaphones just who is going to hell and such. I don't like those people either, and I don't like to be interrupted in the grocery store by someone who wants to preach the gospel to me. I'm not one of those people. I'm a 25 year old big kid who wishes her Daddy could still walk on water, and her Mommy could still make everything better with a kiss and a bowl of ice cream. I can't say that I spent my entire life being an atheist, but I was pretty agnostic for a better part of it, although I went to church and grew up in an Episcopal school. I could recite the lord's prayer in latin frontwards and backwards while standing on one foot, but for years I couldn't tell you what "temptation" meant.
I'll sum it up like this: Before Alpha - I had been going to church regularly for a year. I was diagnosed with severe depression, had a husband who couldn't live in the same country as me, and had a worthless college degree from a college that nobody in Louisiana knew existed (this college). I prayed, I thought I had gotten a pretty good understanding of God, and wanted my husband to be Christian. But I never touched a bible. I thought that was someone else's fictional history book that makes normal people just go nuts when they read it.
During Alpha - The best description I can tell you is that I felt loved. The basis of Alpha is to learn and discuss through the friendships you make with the others in your small group, and I did just that. These weren't people I'd normally hang out with, all of them were old enough to be my parents, and none of them had probably even considered voting for Gore four years ago. I had the best time on the course and looked forward to every Wednesday evening where I'd get a free dinner, good conversation with my group, I'd learn something and every now and then, I'd feel comfortable to ask one of my dumb questions. "So just what is the difference between Jesus and the Holy Ghost?" I made friends with these people, and learned incredibly valuable things through their life experiences.
After Alpha - I've finally understood just what the Bible has to do with all of this. It's not just a book, or just a history book for some. I can finally see it as my "owner's manual" for myself and my relationship with God. Not only that, it's no longer boring to me. I'm reading it, and I'm actually wanting to read more. It's amazing, I've tried reading it before and it was always just another boring story I didn't want to know. And this relationship with God thing, it's not about looking up and asking for help anymore. It's about feeling the presence all around me and in me, and just saying "thank you", "please" and "if that's what you want, this is what I'll do." It's even better than my imaginary friend from childhood, Bertha Louise May. I have two best friends in my heart. God and my husband. And it has brought my husband and I closer together now that we can share this relationship together.
It's not that I think everyone needs help. There are those who believe in God, but say that they don't need to go to church, or need to read the bible; and there are those who believe there is something, but that they shouldn't have to believe in something so hypocritical. People can live their entire lives without this relationship, and they might be fine. However, I'm forever grateful that I did Alpha. The biggest difference would probably be that I actually do feel that I can achieve fulfillment without buying something. I make mistakes with my money all the time. I just KNEW that the digital camera would be all I ever wanted and would make my life complete. I just KNOW that being skinny will be the end all to my disappointing life. I just KNEW that landing that british husband would make me whole. That's not where I found it. I found it after Alpha, when Hubby and I were discussing part of a gospel we had read, and immediately right there I prayed a "thank you for my husband" prayer that I do probably twenty times a day, and I felt such incredible peace and love, like a ghost wearing heated velvet bear-hugging me. That's my fulfillment.
Anyway, in case you're interested in doing something similar to Alpha or want to know more about it, go to www.alphausa.org and find out where courses are near you. There are hundreds of thousands of courses around the country and the world. And for you other Anglophiles - a lot of the course has to do with listening to lectures in a british accent. How's that for entertainment?
"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest." Matthew 11:28
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