Author: Mary | Page 13 | Spiritual Abuse Blogs

Salem

In doing some research for a class project a year or two after being thrown out of a church, I came across an interactive activity enacting the trials. I sat clicking through it, stunned. I had been familiar with the trials, but I had never thought of them as closely related to my life. But here in an interactive about a bit of 300 year old history, was a reenactment of my expulsion.

https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/salem-interactive/

Are you a witch?
Why do you torture these people?
How do you know you’re not a witch?
We know you’re a witch!
How long have you been a witch?
Don’t deny it! Why won’t you confess?
How long have you been in the snare of the devil?
Why would you laugh? Don’t you see, you’re hurting these people?
You can’t expect peace without a confession!

You would sob, but it’s too much. You stood before your neighbors, your God and your judge and spoke the truth. They saw you, they heard you, and they jailed you.

Now, all of Salem, hungry for drama, seems to have squeezed inside the courthouse…

And on the story goes. Though it’s not precisely accurate, it’s not far from the real proceedings. https://web.archive.org/web/20160106151023/https://salem.lib.virginia.edu/texts/tei/swp?div_id=n24

The interactive haunted me. For the first time after I’d been thrown out, I had found an incident that was very similar to my own. Here is basically my interaction with the man who threw me out:

I feel in my spirit–you aren’t right! You’re lusting after me.
ME: “NO!”
Don’t argue with the man of God! I know you’re lusting after me, and you won’t destroy my ministry!
If you don’t get right, I’ll throw you out!
I don’t even know if you can be saved.
I knew someone was hindering revival!
You’re hindering revival! You need to repent!

He went on to tell me why he thought I was lusting. He had the spirit of discernment. He felt it in his spirit. I’d made him grab a folding chair I was sitting on and drag it around the room. I’d gone to the store at the same time he and his wife were there….

And so I identify with those tried as witches in Salem.

What happened in Salem, and why did the witch hunts and trials take place? Why were they allowed to go so far? Superstition, lack of knowledge or common sense, emphasis on the devil doing things to people, mass hysteria, toxins in the water or food, boredom, a fear of secret ‘sins’ being discovered, or guilt for those sins still hidden, the power of a few, the jealousy of others… there are many guesses as to what happened in Salem. I think it was a combination. And I think witch hunts still happen today.

Read Parts Two and Three.

True Worship

When I would go to a pastor for advice or support rather than praying or studying the Bible for myself, or when I would feel that God wanted one thing, but would second guess myself due to something that was preached or something the pastor said, something was definitely out of balance. I put my health and others’ at risk by going to church sick and pushing myself beyond reasonable limits. I bent over backward to make a good appearance, and was afraid to say “no” to any suggestion that was made.

In service, if everyone ran, I ran. If they danced, I danced. If the pastor indicated we should shout, I shouted. But none of that was worship.

Worship is a way of honoring God. If a person is focused on what other people are doing or are expecting you to do, they are honoring other people, not God. Worship is a form of love. It is not a mechanical, directed display, but a focused, heartfelt expression of adoration.

God, I want to be a true worshiper. Let my focus, love, adoration and worship be on You. Not on what others are saying or doing and not on what anyone else expects or demands, and not on what actions I’m performing. Worship is not a science of specific words, moves and actions, but an intimate place where the words, moves, and actions cease to have importance, because all are outweighed by love. Teach me to worship.

A little about fear, anger, jealousy and God

The Lord is my judge
When I have need of a savior
He maketh me to go through trials
He leadeth me through many tests…

No one, NO ONE, should misread the 23rd Psalm that way. How often it happens though! Sorry. Had to vent for a minute. We should never slander God by saying that, when bad things happen, God is testing or trying a person. If God made people do some of the bad things they do, in order to test or try someone else, He would be participant in their sin! And God DOES NOT SIN. Above that, He is righteous, and will not tell someone to do what He cannot- so He won’t tell someone to hate, lie, steal, cheat, slander, malign, rape, or murder someone else. The line of thinking that if something bad happens, “God won’t put on us more than we can bear” or “God is just testing you…” is totally, utterly against the word of God.

Anyway, so in reality:
The Lord is my SHEPHERD
I shall NOT WANT
He maketh me to lie down in green pastures
He leadeth me beside the still waters
He RESTORETH my soul

David was being chased by an angry, jealous king. He had done nothing wrong. He had, in fact, slain a giant and in doing so he had stopped the Philistines to a degree. He had played music to the king when he was troubled, to soothe his heart and mind. He sat at the king’s table and was his son’s best friend. But the king was angry and jealous of this young man. Then Samuel made it worse by anointing him to be king after Saul.

Saul was seething mad. David was sitting at the table with him, when Saul suddenly grabbed a javelin and threw it at him. No warning. Not exactly friendly territory, that king’s table!

Yet rather than fighting back, David ran. He left his home, his dad and brothers, and even his country. Did he discuss his problems involving the king? Sure. And there was nothing wrong with that. At what point did David draw the line in dealing with “God’s anointed” then? In deliberately physically harming him.

Later, the same thought is echoed when Saul died. David killed the man that killed Saul, again because Saul was “God’s anointed.” The man thought David would be glad. That angry, jealous, murderous old man was gone. But David mourned for Saul, and for Jonathan.

There are several odd things in the story of Saul and David. After all, David was mourning the man who sought to kill him. He wouldn’t “touch God’s anointed” even though Saul himself was trying to “touch” David, who was also anointed by God!

I wonder if that’s what made God call David the man after His own heart? That attitude of seeing what God wanted someone to be, rather than seeing their present condition and their faults? And I wonder if that’s why God gave mercy to David, a murderous and adulterous king, when he needed mercy? Because he showed mercy, he was shown mercy.

And maybe it goes beyond even that. Saul was angry. Saul wanted David dead because of the murder in his heart. David wanted Uriah dead because he was afraid. What a vast difference in attitude. Saul had a murderous, jealous, angry heart. He never sought repentance. David was afraid. God took his fear, showed it to him, and said, “Yes, I know.” David saw himself as he was, admitted his sin, and repented. God could use that kind of heart. Even with his sin, in spite of his fear, God could use a man who was humble enough to admit his failures, even though he was king.

God’s love

In my former church, the pastor emphasized that we can’t be “good enough” for God. I assume that what he meant was that we will never be able to “earn” salvation- it’s a gift. But his statement bothered me because of the way it was used.

Recently I went to a Christian comedian “concert” (Ken Davis). He told a story that his young granddaughter (under six) had gotten lost in the mountains while they were camping a few years ago. They searched for 3 1/2 hours, and couldn’t find her. Called in search and rescue. Nothing. A storm was coming in. He was in a panic, sure, after not finding her in all that time, that she would never be found alive. Then the call came- hikers found her over 2 miles from camp, sitting on a rock. When they brought her back to camp, someone snapped a picture of him talking to her. He was squatted down, holding both her hands, looking straight in her eyes. And he asked us what we thought he was telling her. “Don’t you ever do that again!” “How could you wander off like that!” “You know better!” No. All he could say, again and again, was “I love you, I love you, I love you.” And he asked how we could think God, who loves us so much more, could do any less.

On the way home, I kept thinking about that. There was very little ever said about the love of God in my former church. But His love is very real, and very near. We may not ever be “good enough” to earn salvation, but that’s because it’s free. And if that’s the case, none of us is “bad enough” to slip beyond God’s love and mercy either. We have more than a Savior. We have a Father who loves us more dearly than we can even understand. And I love Him, too.

Humorous Discoveries

Well, I’m not blogging as much now as I did at first. That’s actually a good thing in several ways. I write for therapy, so silence on my blog shows that things are going well. I’ve found a church that I feel comfortable in, and several activities that aren’t related to a specific church, which is very positive since I don’t want all my friends and activities to focus on one group ever again. I’m beginning to make friends with non-Pentecostals, too, which is very positive.

There are a few things that have amazed me that I don’t think I’ve written about. The first is that though I was always taught in church that my skirts and hair were my identifiers, and felt that if I went to a movie or any other “taboo” place that people would see my hair or dress and know I was Pentecostal. I was taught that by going certain places, I would “lose my witness.” As though people with no Pentecostal background would recognize that I was Pentecostal and was breaking the rules. Fascinatingly, no one outside the church seems to notice or care how I dress or whether my hair is uncut, unless they have specific background with Pentecost themselves. I love it!

The other day I started noticing that I am going a little overboard with things at times. It’s as though I need a few weeks of total involvement in one area before I can let it go and move on to something else. For instance, I watched quite a few movies for two or three weeks. Then I stopped watching any. I have no problem with movies, but it was as though I needed the experience and needed to prove that I could, and then was finished with that experience for awhile. I won something on the radio, and have wanted to call every time they had a contest since. (I could rarely call in church because other members would listen and condemn the winner if it wasn’t totally wholesome in their opinion.) And we won’t mention the number of hours on the internet! But that, too, is normalizing as time goes by.

The people at my new church are entirely different. No attendance is taken, no one has called if I don’t come. But they are always glad to see me if I do go. There have been no restrictions that I must attend there for a certain amount of time before getting involved, nor have there been demands that I must do a certain amount for them. Shortcomings are laughed off and qualities are brought out. There are no big people and little people, no popularity contests and no shunning. I’ve never seen a group of people get along so well, just because they could and not because they had to. It’s wonderful.

It’s nice to have the freedom to do what I want when I want to, and to feel more comfortable just enjoying life as it comes.