-
Christian Chat is a moderated online Christian community allowing Christians around the world to fellowship with each other in real time chat via webcam, voice, and text, with the Christian Chat app. You can also start or participate in a Bible-based discussion here in the Christian Chat Forums, where members can also share with each other their own videos, pictures, or favorite Christian music.
If you are a Christian and need encouragement and fellowship, we're here for you! If you are not a Christian but interested in knowing more about Jesus our Lord, you're also welcome! Want to know what the Bible says, and how you can apply it to your life? Join us!
To make new Christian friends now around the world, click here to join Christian Chat.
A
Oh, just wait. But seriously, Christians save themselves for marriage, and they want their marriage to last the rest of their life. The idea that a person would exploit that in the name of God just so they could get into a country that has more opportunities, just makes me want to shutter. Besides, I don't know what other countries are like, but Canada and the USA aren't exactly briming with opportunity right now. Canada's jobless rate is higher now that it has been in... I don't know how many years. Sometimes I wonder if people who move here have realistic expectations. I don't know if I've told this story before, but my parent's friend went on a misson to Haiti when she was my age. She came back engaged to a Haitian man who really seemed like a man of God. They had three kids. Well, after awhile he reverted to how he was raised which is that a woman does all the work. They split up and he ended up living with another woman. Then he was arrested for beating her. Then my parents had these other close friends who were missionaries and their... I don't remember the details, but their only daughter married a guy from Africa, and she ended up become estranged from her parents and then she found out he was only after her citizenship. My sister warned me about that during my own cross-culture relationship. See, the way I see it is that people have so many little assumptions about how they think life should be. Then when you get married you find out that the other person sees thinks things should be a different way, and you have to work that out and make compromises. When you have a cross-cultural marriage all those would just be compounded. I mean I had a really close guy friend who was Chinese and even if I'd fallen completely in love with him, I don't know if I could have made a marriage with him work. The way that he was raised was just too different from me. I mean not that there aren't a lot of couples out there who've made it work. Joshua Harris' parents are an example. I don't think his parents would deny that there was extra work to overcome their cultural differences, worth it though it might have been. In one of his books he talks about how a couple needs to talk about how they're going to overcome their cultural differences before they get married. But Harris' parents were both raised in the States. I can't imagine where I'd begin to work out cultural differences with someone raised somewhere very different from Canada. And the bottom line is that I think every Christian should marry the person that they think they would have the greatest chance of staying married to.
"I am sending you out like sheep among wolves. Therefore be as shrewd as snakes and as innocent as doves." Matthew 10:16
"I am sending you out like sheep among wolves. Therefore be as shrewd as snakes and as innocent as doves." Matthew 10:16
A
I didn't realize that Missy2shoes is Australian, I thought she was American. So, if he hasn't contacted you, you can take it as insult against your country (maybe he's heard that economy is not so hot right now) but don't take it personally. I mean I know you're just joking, but seriously, I think all he cares about is what flag is next to your name.
I hope this doesn't deter people from other countries e-mailing me just to say hi or asking me what life is like here in the most multicultural city in the world. I was telling a guy from Grand Rapids how the vast majority of the churches near my house are Chinese churches. If one knew nothing about Christianity and were judging it based on Toronto alone, they'd probably think that it was an East Asian phenomenon. I went to an non-ethnic Pentecostal church last Sunday. There were lots of people who appeared to be of East Asian and African heritage, but I didn't see a single person who looked like they could be South Asian (like Indian or Sri Lankan). I think South Asians are not just under represented at that church but in Christianity in general. I know there are a lot of Christians in India, but there aren't enough, and I don't know where there's a single Indian church around me, even though there are so many people from India, including the family who I rent from. They have a shrine to the Hindu elephant god* on the top floor. That's also where their wireless router is, so everything I write on-line first goes to the shrine before being scattered in cyberspace and then arriving at your computer. I mean I'm sure there's a Indian church somewhere here, you'd be hard pressed to find an ethnicity that doesn't have a church here, but not enough to accommodate the huge Indian population, like there is with the Chinese churches. You know, I went to a Chinese Pentecostal church once. The sermon was in Cantonese but the pastor was unmistakeably Pentecostal. It was funny. Actually it wasn't funny, it was a funeral. It was very, very sad. But, it was neat to see that Chinese Pentecostal pastors preach in the same fiery manner as those born here.
By the way, Missy2shoes. It's so cool that you're from South Australia. My brother-in-law's mum is from Adelaide! My sister went to visit her mother-in-law's family and they went to Kangaroo Island.
*I actually initially wrote "god" as "God" Wow, force of habit, hey?
I hope this doesn't deter people from other countries e-mailing me just to say hi or asking me what life is like here in the most multicultural city in the world. I was telling a guy from Grand Rapids how the vast majority of the churches near my house are Chinese churches. If one knew nothing about Christianity and were judging it based on Toronto alone, they'd probably think that it was an East Asian phenomenon. I went to an non-ethnic Pentecostal church last Sunday. There were lots of people who appeared to be of East Asian and African heritage, but I didn't see a single person who looked like they could be South Asian (like Indian or Sri Lankan). I think South Asians are not just under represented at that church but in Christianity in general. I know there are a lot of Christians in India, but there aren't enough, and I don't know where there's a single Indian church around me, even though there are so many people from India, including the family who I rent from. They have a shrine to the Hindu elephant god* on the top floor. That's also where their wireless router is, so everything I write on-line first goes to the shrine before being scattered in cyberspace and then arriving at your computer. I mean I'm sure there's a Indian church somewhere here, you'd be hard pressed to find an ethnicity that doesn't have a church here, but not enough to accommodate the huge Indian population, like there is with the Chinese churches. You know, I went to a Chinese Pentecostal church once. The sermon was in Cantonese but the pastor was unmistakeably Pentecostal. It was funny. Actually it wasn't funny, it was a funeral. It was very, very sad. But, it was neat to see that Chinese Pentecostal pastors preach in the same fiery manner as those born here.
By the way, Missy2shoes. It's so cool that you're from South Australia. My brother-in-law's mum is from Adelaide! My sister went to visit her mother-in-law's family and they went to Kangaroo Island.
*I actually initially wrote "god" as "God" Wow, force of habit, hey?