Hi Zolana, Welcome to the forums!
Firstly a little about me, I'm married with 3 kids, my wife and I agree on what we think about all this crazy stuff
I'm sure my wife would be better at answering or helping you with things so I will ask her to poke her noes in here too
We fell out of Christianity about 6 years ago now, about the same time as Stephen, and lost all our contacts in church with it. I wouldn't call them friends really, I think friends would have stuck by us a little better. We were kind of forgotten about, it wasn't the best feeling in the world. The church we were at was quite busy and social and having that removed did leave a void.
Ok so take a deep breath and don't panic.
First off there is a lot of information and a lot of it is simple and makes sense - actually everything I have learnt and understood has been logical and simple so far, even if it's been a bit deeper than learning about passover, it always links in and makes sense somewhere. What you need to understand though is different people have different opinions on a loads of this stuff, and I think as long as those people aren't forcing you to think that they are "right" you can figure a lot of it out for yourself.
There are sites and resources that will make you feel stupid for either not understanding or thinking they way they do, if you ever feel like that remember it is their problem and not yours. Hidden in the stuff that Craig writes is a little bit of "if you don't think like me you are obviously a moron" - so although there is a lot of good and useful information in there some of his ideas are questionable.
On Paul: Some people say he was Satan/possessed/influenced - some people say he was exactly who he said he was. Personally I have not found enough evidence for the first one and more evidence to the fact that he was taken advantage of at a later date (as in people forging or changing letters from him). The issue with that is there are books accredited it Paul in the "new testament" that I don't think he wrote. Best way I have found to deal with the letters is to not take them as Scripture, because they were never designed or intended to be Scripture anyway. If you read them from the view point of looking advice or historical interest they are a lot more helpful and have no hold over you.
Like Stephen said there is a truck load of stuff to get your head into if you want it, but what I would do first is look into the meanings of the feasts. I think they are the most important part of finding our way home, and I would recommend anything Ken Power has written on them - although Craig has written some good stuff (if you blank out the random stabs at Paul for no contextual reason). Ken is another guy you might have heard of, he used to work with Craig back in the day. I don't agree with Ken's point of view on many things but the difference is Ken is a very gentle man and he doesn't force himself or his views on anyone. He is extremely wise, although I doubt he would ever admit to that, basically he is the kind of guy you would want as a father/grandfather lol. There was a little disagreement with Ken and Craig a year or so ago when Craig brought out the terribly researched anti Paul stuff.
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You will probably have to forget stuff you were told and start again with a fresh mind, I found we had to kinda do that. It's a wonderful road of discovery but it's not easy, and I suppose it's not meant to be. Again I'll ask Ju to read your posts too, but again welcome to the forum and don't feel afraid to ask anything
. I did some research on Ellen White and found that I did not agree with her prophet status, but she seemed to only point to Christ? I pray that God would help me understand how she was leading people astray, and then I started to notice inconsistencies with Paul's writings, and now it all makes sense.
