What do you believe??

So today we had our first Doctrines class.... we are talking Salvation Army doctrines.... i was kinda dreading the class because some phase 2's had said its pretty boring and also, i thought they were just gonna take the SA doctrines and shove them down our throat and make us believe them.... but i was wrong. as usual!!!!

i really enjoyed the class. Jonathanis teaching it and he decided that he didnt want to just present the doctrines and expect us to believe, he ultimately wants us to decided what WE believe and stick with it. so first thing he got us to do was to write down what our essential beliefs are as Christians. and i thought it would be cool to show you guys what i wrote down... its some pretty broad statements but we didnt have ages to think bout it and these ones are pretty much my core beliefs! so this is my list:

- I believe God created the world and that we didnt just happen to come from 2 atoms by accident.
- I belive in the Trinity. The Father, The Son ( Jesus) and The Holy Spirit who dwells among us now.
- I believe that all scripture is 100% true and that it's all from God.
- I believe that Jesus came dwon as a human but was fully God and died on the cross for my sins, but then rose again after 3 days.
- I believe that Salvation comes when you accept Jesus died for your sins and that it doesnt come from any 'good' works that you may do, but you also need to turn from your sin and follow God 100% in order to have your salvation secure.
- I believe that Jesus is coming again.
- I believe that you body is a temple for the Holy Spirit and should be respected alot. Also that we need to offer our bodies as living sacrifices to God.

So thats what i wrote down.... i think most of them as pretty much core beliefs to any Christian. then in class we had to think bout why we believe what we do and where we got the beliefs from... its a good question. do you get your beliefs from what others believe? or do u get them just from what u think? or do u take what others say and test it? or is it from personal experience? one of the biggest things is personal experience for me. i was thinking about the last one i put and i didnt used to believe that, until a few slip ups in not respecting my body as much as i should and the amount of conviction i had from God and how much i really saw that God cared for me, so it really caused me to have that one as an essential belief.

we also had to answer the questions is it important to have beliefs? is it important for a community/body/church to have beliefs? and if you say yes, why?

one of the things that i came to the conclusion is that it is important for a community to have beliefs..... to voice what their core beliefs are and it all comes down to one word UNITY. when i came to War College, i didnt know any of my session mates, never met them ever..... but because we were all Christians and we all believed in God and the bible etc.... we were united. i felt a sense of unity, just purely on the fact that we believe mostly the same core beliefs. i think that is sooo important for a community to have.... if they didnt have beliefs or if they didnt know what their beliefs were, everyone would be a bit all over the place and there wouldnt be huge unity....


i could write soooo much more on lots of other topics as the past couple of days, God has been revealing cool stuff to me, but that is what is on my heart at the moment. oh and one more thing from Pray the Bible this morning.....

we were praying for Spiritual Strength for our fellow session mates..... and as i was praying, God spoke to me about Is 40:29-31 which says:

He gives power to the weak and strength to the powerless. Even youths will become weak and tired, and young men will fall in exhaustion.But those who trust in the Lord will find new strength. They will soar high on wings like eagles. They will run and not grow weary. They will walk and not faint.

now this is just what i think, i am not sure whether its true or not, but i think it is..... in that the part where it says he gives power to the weak and strength to the powerless.... it occured to me, that we arent just praying for any strength, we are praying for SPIRITUAL strength.... i felt God telling me that he gives power to the weak, but we need to be weak in order for Gods power to show through.... if we r all stubborn and think we r so tough, God's power isnt going to show through. and he gives us strength when we are powerless.... i struggle with this ( anyone who knows me, knows that i like to pretend everything is ok!!!!!).... we HAVE to be powerless and we have to be weak in order for Gods power to fully work in our lives..... what does anyone else think about this?? do you agree with me??


sorry its a bit long and alot to go through, but i am interested.... what are your core beliefs??? and do u agree with my last statement bout Is 40:29-31???