My Grandmother used to make me go to church dressed in best clothes. I am almost certain the church was of the Protestant denomination, Church of England?
The only thing more boring I have experienced in my life was attending a piano recital at the Sydney Opera House whilst on a school trip in 1975. (I fell asleep during the performance)
What did I get out of going to church? Reinforcement that religion was super boring.
If I remember correctly..."for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son so that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have everlasting life."
My mom's family was from the Dutch reformed church. She remembers she got a peppermint and when it was up the reverend said Amen and it was utterly boring. I have visited such a church a few times and it was indeed very boring.
My dad was atheist. I was not raised christian. At 12 or 13 I started to test if God existed for a year. I said stuff like: If I don't get an 8+ (10 is the highest, like an A) for German in school I don't believe in God.
Everything I asked for happened a whole year long. The last one was that I played lousy with tennis and said that and won. Then it was too coincidental and I believed God existed and promised Him that I'd go to a church, but my mom had said church was boring.
At the same time my brother saw Jesus while Zen meditating and he said that I said he should look for a church. He went to different ones. Reformed boring, catholic boring, other brand of reformed boring. Eventually he ended up in a pentecostal church and took me with him. It was boring.
He said: Normally it's more fun. Okay. The teen services were fun. After a few months it dawned on me that I had to ask God to forgive my sins and I prayed the sinners prayer and then I was saved. I hated my friends and we gossipped about each other, but after the prayer I could hug them.
My mom was afraid that we had gone to a cult and came to check and stayed. She got super enthusiastic. All these years she hadn't gone to church nor talked about it. My poor dad. It was too much. His whole family had gone nuts. He fled a few days but came back and she learned to be a bit less enthusiastic to him. A year before he died she said he had to get saved and he did.
He saw stuff happen though. Family members got healed after prayer. 2 aunts with cancer got healed, one instantly, my FIL. He also went to a meeting with her where she got prayer. He once went to their neighbour who was sick. He said: You have to go to that church. They said: We don't believe in God. He said: No me neither, but I've seen some amazing things happen.
