Search This Blog

Wednesday, November 28, 2012

Our Journey and a word about who we are (and were)





About us as we are about Him.

Me: (Rory Moore) came to the Lord in 1979 at the age of 28 and married Linda in 1983. We have three children.



For 24 years Linda and I were in our church "inner circle" and doing almost everything you can do in a church without turning "pro".  In 24 years I served as an Assistant Pastor, Youth Leader, licensed minister, Elder, Board member, preacher, teacher,  fund raiser, altar worker, deacon, building maintenance, counselor, home and hospital visitation minister and we were financial pillars to the church in every way via tithing, offerings, fund raisers and more.

I guess we were typical, average loyal church supporters. 

We also worked closely with all of our pastors and leadership and had many friends in ministry, in the local church scene, and with other fellowship circles. -long before the internet. 

Linda was Choir Director for 7 years, a "special" singer, Sunday School teacher, church secretary treasurer, fund-raiser worker, and did many "helps". 
We were faithful attendees of almost every service and function of the church. For two decades we were among the first to arrive and were among the very last to leave church services and were often there 2-4 hours on those days, plus staff meetings. 
We had 4 meetings per week including 2x on Sunday, Wed., and Friday evening; then as we morphed over the years, two regular services per week.

 The decline in church gathering and prayer took place after we incorporated into a 501c3 organization.

 As the years went by, we did not notice the progressive decline away from the scriptures and prayer as we stayed busy with church programs, activities, and the routine of church life. This decline occurred as our church transitioned from a denominational Pentecostal church into a non-denominational Evangelical Christian community church

In 2004 in the wake of two events, a family crisis and the passing of my dad, in my grief and sorrow, I sought the Lord fervently and returned to regular and prayerful study of the Bible.

After "praying through" to a spiritual renewal, I asked the Lord for deeper understanding about our tithe doctrine after noticing a verse in Nehemiah 13:5 that said how the "singers" were given tithes!
Linda was Choir Leader and shouldn't she be getting tithes? (The Pastor received all tithes in our church).

When I showed that to Pastor, he looked at me with a funny expression on his face and mumbled a few words I do not recall. It struck me as strange singers and doorkeepers were to receive tithes. So I asked the Lord to show me the truth about this, and the Lord spoke to me clearly "start reading the New Testament." As I did, He began showing me verses overlooked, what tithing was under the law, and that ministers were expected to work and be examples of giving.

A few weeks later it came as a shock when I realized there was no direct instruction to any Christians or churches that they were to pay tithes!  (this was before I later discovered that Biblical tithes were never monetary).

I literally thought I was losing my mind. How could everyone I knew be wrong? But I simply could not find monetary tithing given to any church or saint in scripture as New Testament! 

Too sensitive a subject to discuss?
Mentioning this to a few others about my questions only brought an attempt to "correct" us in the form of a surprise visit from the pastor and other elders one Monday night. 
When I attempted to question tithing in front of the elders, the subject was immediately shut down by Pastor and no questioning was permitted in front of us elders.

We never dreamed of leaving our church but on Sept. 29, 2004, but after weeks of wrestling with this decision, we walked away from the 501c3 church we helped to start in 1993 as founding members. As typical middle-of-the-road Christian role models of the sincere church going family for 24 years, we realized we now had to leave the church in order to find God all over again.

Starting over with Jesus.
So after more than 3,500 church services, staff meetings, revivals, and related gatherings, we walked out into the unknown.   
  
It was very difficult, as not once in 24 years had we left our church.
But The Lord began to confirm these things through others, in a multitude of dreams,  and we were seeing many things in Scripture  we had not noticed or overlooked.  The Lord God became our Shepherd. 

As He revealed more of Himself to me, the Lord told me to "Write" and we now minister to far more people through writing and ministering the Word of God -and we are glad to do so gladly and freely. 

Writing the book, "The Tithe That Binds"  was the off-shoot of my personal study and questioning the Lord on the subject of tithing. When the book was in the writing stage, at one point I sought the Lord for the title as I wanted HIM to name it.  For three days we prayed for a title and on the third day, He gave us the name of it, and He also provided a Christian publisher who worked and gave of her time to us freely in order to publish it.

A second revised edition is forthcoming, expanded and further building on the truths regarding what the scripture does or does not say about monetary tithing.
Link:https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_QEoDsSUC_N-uwT-2p9lwm-QfXf4sqyY6azRFrJFiog/edit?usp=sharing


I have several more books to publish such as "Who are God's Chosen People", The Giants, Nephilium, and Truth", Preterism?, and "WHO ARE YOU LORD?" according to the preaching by the disciples in Acts after they were Spirit filled.

At this point, 2022, we are 18 years out of "Institutional" Christianity and enjoying fellowship with other ministers and saints who have also come out of the system. 
It took us more than two years of "de-churching" and un-learning what we had  been taught from men, in order to learn and be taught from God's Word. 

In order to learn from God we had to be willing to unlearn what we learned from men. -which is what Jesus taught but the churches do not.

The Bible is a wonderful and amazing book and has become a beacon of truth to us as we seek to do what it says rather than what others say it says...







2 comments:

  1. Rory and Linda! Glad you put a link to your blog... more good reading for sure, my friends!

    ReplyDelete
  2. What a great testimony, Rory and Linda!!

    Actually, I imagine that it was rather painful for you to leave the church after you had been so deeply rooted in her with all those many, many activities. Even though our minds might have understood that some things went wrong, our hearts are not so easy to unplug from those people who we once loved being with inside the church (that was my very experience).

    Also, I wholeheartedly agree that "the Bible is a wonderful and amazing book"! :-)

    May God bless you both immensely in the days ahead and keep you in His strong grip always.

    Love,
    Susanne from Bavaria

    ReplyDelete