We (as a family) decided to go to
church and, where I stay, a lot of churches were not really doing crossover
service but we knew a church that was hosting one so we decided to go for it.
We prayed, pastor preached, then time for offering. Most of the people that
were in the church that day were obviously not regular members (like me) but we
were all Nigerians. Offering bowl passes by me, I honestly wanted to put money
in the bowl but I had reasons why:
1.
I was standing and I honestly didn't
want to sit down to search my bag filled with many necessities to bring out
money... so I decided that since I knew the ushers, before I left the church I
would put in my offering.
2.
I wasn’t given an offering envelope
and going to get one was another journey entirely.
3.
I honestly didn’t feel like putting
in money… something kept holding me back but I knew I was going to do it at the
end.
4.
In general, I had intentions of
dropping cash!
Offering
bowl don pass dey go and it was now time to pray on the money. The pastor just
looked at the offering bowl, stopped the choir and said;
"If
you have not put anything inside this offering bowl raise your hand?"
After no
one responded,
He said,
“This is
the first day of the New Year; you should be ready to put in an offering?” ..etc
After talking about how we should
all put in money into the offering bowl, the pastor now started praying and he
was like;
"For those who have put in
money inside this basket, may they be blessed this new year, they will not be
sick, etc"….. Basically, he was only praying for those that put in money.
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
I’m actually confused on whether I
should rant or not... should I be ranting about a pastor? And would that be considered
rude?
*still in
a dilemma*
Anyway, it was a HUGE shock for me
that a pastor would do such a thing. I had good intentions of definitely
putting in my offering. But after the first comment, I was 1,000,000,000% sure
that NOT a dime that I own would SMELL the offering bowl. I’m giving to God and
not to the pastor, I agree; and I probably should’ve still put money in that
bowl, I agree. But, I thought about it and I figured I would save that offering,
and when I go to my church, I would put it inside the offering bowl plus my
official offering for that Sunday. I was actually speechless at such manner of
approaching people. I know churches run on money but such aggressiveness as to
collecting money from the people in the house of God, IS NOT RIGHT! It came across
as the man was desperate or something. My friend was giving me one eye because I
didn’t give money but I did not care. I had already made up my mind after his
first comment.
I don’t know if this is a rant or not but it was my first experience in the new year so why not share?
Has anyone gone to a church where it
is by force to drop an offering, is it not a personal choice?
I’d love to hear your opinions...on
this whole thing and since we are on this topic,
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Hope it’s filled with love, joy,
blessings and greater achievements than all previous years combined!
And with all the love in my heart,
Tharrisall
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