Category: grace | Spiritual Abuse Blogs

Love Lessons

I never related very well to the parable of the prodigal. I heard people amazed that the father ran to meet the prodigal and that the prodigal was unworthy. Those things I got, but… so? My own parents were distant growing up in some ways. I’m not sure they would have run, but they’d have welcomed me, even if through slightly gritted teeth.

But… I’ve recently become acquainted with a couple who fosters kids. They’ve had their current fosters since before the pandemic, and their fosters will be adopted soon. And the man has been crying all week. Every time someone asks how he is, every time someone asks about the kids, he chokes up. They aren’t his kids. He’s know they were only there temporarily. That they’re being adopted is great for the kids, and he has said so, but still, this has been a really hard transition for him.

I’ve watched him with those kids. I’ve watched him live in the moment with them, and watched him choke up when the kids won’t see. It’s hard for him to see them go, hard knowing they will be moving away. There’ll be an emptiness in this couple’s lives when those kids are gone, and their own grief is as real as their love for the kids.

If he were the father in that parable I would understand why he was running – not just to welcome him back, but because he missed them and he loves them, no matter what they do, no matter where they are. If this man were the father, and he saw one of his fosters – not even his own kids – coming toward him, he’d run, and no one who knows him would be surprised at that. Not at all. No matter what they’d done, no matter where they were, he’d run to them if they ever needed him, and he wouldn’t ever consider them “unworthy” (like I was taught from the story of the prodigal). He wouldn’t, and neither did the father in the story. They’d be the first to remind them of their worth, not because of what they’d done or not done, but simply because they are.

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Why Oneness Pentecostals have Salvation Wrong (Acts 2:38) and you should Avoid It

Salvation has been a topic for eons – both in the Christian religion and other spirituality based religions. Societies and people across the pages of history have asked the question, and attempted to answer, the age-old question, “What is there after death? Is there an afterlife? If so, how do I enter it?”

For modern Oneness Pentecostals, they believe they have revealed, re-discovered, dug up and reformed the ancient ‘truth’ of Scripture, how one makes it to heaven, pleases God, obeys the Scripture, is justified, and finds true holiness, something that was supposedly closed off from mankind for centuries due to paganism, false doctrine and the likes of the Roman Catholic church.

Recently, a young man and his wife contacted me on the YouTube channel asking what my thoughts were on the Acts 2:38 message taught by Oneness Pentecostals, known as their salvation doctrine (soteriology). They wanted to leave the United Pentecostal Church for all the legalism and dogma (false doctrine) but were confused about attending other churches that didn’t teach Acts 2:38.

If you are not familiar with the evolved doctrines of the Oneness Pentecostal church (Evolved because it has changed many times since 1901ad at its inception) on Soteriology, Acts 2:38, in a nutshell, means that you deny the Trinity, that you are baptized in Jesus Name only, not in the titles Father, Son and Holy Ghost (this is a forced effort in denying the Trinity), that you repent by adopting their holiness standards (woman never wear pants, cut their hair, etc), and that you speak in tongues (initial evidence) as the gift of the Holy Ghost.

While this doctrine can be explained in multiple ways, both favorably and unfavorably, I have determined it to be incorrectly dividing the Word and placing upon people a yoke that Scripture did not demand and more importantly, the divergent doctrinal error cascades to many more doctrinal errors.

Also, important to note that I am purposed to equip the children of God to spot doctrinal errors. I’m not bitter, or vengeful, nor attacking any one ‘faith’. I’m not attacking anything, I’m focused on correctly dividing God’s Word.

There are many doctrines of Scripture that can be debated, questioned, given the ‘we will never understand that’ brush off, but Salvation is a critical aspect of Christianity and getting this right is paramount to our experiences with God.

First and foremost, Scripture makes it abundantly clear that our justification is by the obedience of one man (Romans 5:19), not of our own, and that it is faith in Christ alone that produces the grace that saves us (Ephesians 2:8). There is more to the Christian life, but the root of ‘how do I get saved’ is found in fully trusting in the finished works of Christ on the Cross. Grace is a gift, not a paycheck.

By way of example of the error of Oneness theology, let us examine vs 37 of the Acts 2:38 narrative to see if it lines up with the entire picture of Biblical salvation.

Now when they heard this, they were pricked in their heart, and said unto Peter and to the rest of the apostles, Men and brethren, what shall we do?

I want to compare this to Acts 16:30 which says, “And brought them out, and said, Sirs, what must I do to be saved?”

In the case of Acts 2:37 you have a band of Jews that just witnessed a miraculous event and then heard the preaching of Peter that condemned them for taking part in rejecting the Messiah. After being convicted that they had done something wrong, they asked, paraphrased, What are we going to do about this??

Here, Peter answers with the hallmark platform of the Oneness Pentecostal Church;

“Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. ” ~ Acts 2:38, KJV

In the case of the Philippian jailer of Acts 16, who just witnessed an equally miraculous event, the question was specifically asked, “What must I do to be saved?”, which was not the case in Acts 2:37. We can make logical leaps, but I’m of the opinion we must take Scripture at face value.

Now – it is evident that Peter gave a pretty salvific response to the Jews, dwelling in Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost, speaking on forgiveness of sins, receiving the gift of the Spirit, being baptized, etc. Yet, something has to be wrong with the Apostle Paul in Acts 16 if that was the message for the Gentile Church because he did not repeat the same answer to the Gentiles. Or, something is wrong with the Oneness Pentecostal interpretation.

In fact, Paul outlined a very different salvation message to the Gentile believer, the Philippian jailer, and he repeated this same message dozens of times in all of his writings: “And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.” (Acts 16:31)

Now, I want to use an argument that the Oneness Pentecostals use all the time in this vein of thought, who will often counter the argument opposing Acts 2:38 (Salvation) with this question, “IF Peter was preaching false doctrine in Acts 2 the other 11 Apostles would have called him out because Scripture says, ‘And Peter, standing with the eleven’ (Acts 2:13).”

Likewise, in Acts 16:31, Scripture said that Paul and Silas both answered the jailer on how to be saved, “And they said…” They were in agreement – and that wasn’t to repeat Acts 2:38. Acts 15 shows Paul and Barnabas and the entire elder council of the Christian Church speaking of what it takes for a Gentile to be saved. False doctrine (and legalism) was being rooted out of the Christian Church from the very beginning.

The Day of Pentecost, Signs, and Wonders

The real reason I’m writing this is is an examination of the upper room experience in Acts 2, to highlight the eisegetical error of this theology. As miraculous as this event was, Scripture does not portray it to be a repeatable event, and this highlights the error of the Acts 2:38 salvation doctrine of the Oneness Pentecostal church.

When Acts 2:38 says, ‘and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost‘, this has been interpreted (eisegetically) by Oneness Pentecostal theologians as speaking in tongues, or as they call it, the initial evidence of speaking in tongues. This is a belief that when one receives the Spirit of Christ, i.e. the gift of the Holy Ghost, they will, as seen in the upper room, speak in other tongues as the Spirit gives them utterance.

Indeed, they have made the claim that if one does not speak in tongues, they have not received Christ, they are not saved, and heaven will not be their home until they do. Their soteriology is wrapped up in the signs and wonders gift of speaking in another language.

But – is this what that Scripture really means? Two examinations of both events prove this to be patently false. If Paul told the jailer to speak in tongues in order to be saved, we could take that message and run with it. If the elder council of Acts 15 said to speak in tongues, we could run with it. If Paul taught the Church of Ephesus “For you are saved, by grace, (which is received when you speak in tongues)…” we could take that message and run with it.

But that is not what Scripture declares.

First and foremost, we see this evidenced immediately following Peter’s preaching. Don’t forget, Peter did NOT say that the gift of the Holy Ghost was ‘speaking in tongues’. This is an amalgamation of examples where people did speak in tongues on several occasions in the book of Acts (Cornelius Acts 10) so thus, every one will/must. Is this true?

Act 2:40 And with many other words did he testify and exhort, saying, Save yourselves from this untoward generation.
Act 2:41 Then they that gladly received his word were baptized: and the same day there were added unto them about three thousand souls.

It is commonly accepted by theologians and scholars that vs 41 indicates 3,000 people became new converts, Christians in the aftermath of Peter’s message. If 120 were in the upper room speaking in tongues, with cloven tongues of fire sitting upon them, with reverberating rushing mighty winds seen and heard by all – imagine the attraction that 3,000 people repeating that event would create?

And yet – Scripture simply says they were baptized and added to the church. This is miraculous! Imagine today a town of 100,000 having THOUSANDS converted to the faith in one evening? Miraculous.

But, did they speak in tongues?

The Signs of the Upper Room Experience

If the Acts 2 experience at Pentecost was a repeatable event, to the degree that it was tied to an individual believers salvation experience, then we would be wise to follow it exactly as exampled in Scripture. Let’s take Scripture at face value.

Act 2:1 And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. Act 2:2 And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. Act 2:3 And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. Act 2:4 And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance. Act 2:5 And there were dwelling at Jerusalem Jews, devout men, out of every nation under heaven.
Act 2:6 Now when this was noised abroad, the multitude came together, and were confounded, because that every man heard them speak in his own language.

The three signs of the Pentecostal experience are these:

The Spirit was preceded by the rushing mighty wind. The Greek word here for ‘sound’ is ēchos and it means literally ‘a loud or confused noise, that is, a roar‘. If you have ever stood on the ridge of the Grand Canyon you have heard a rushing mighty wind. The upper room would have been similar.
The Spirit was preceded by cloven tongues like as of fire. This was something that appeared to all of them, not an apparition only visible to a single person. These have been described by scholars as scintillations, lambent flashes of fire that appeared throughout the room, splitting licks of fire that sat upon each person.
The tongues that were spoken by each recipient was an immediately translated known language. There was and must be someone in the audience that recognized the language being spoken. This was not a private ‘prayer language’ as some Charismatics call what is now known as babbling, nor a language of angels.

Equipped with this view of the miraculous event of the day of Pentecost, we must then approach the modern day sign of ‘tongues’, through the lens of the Oneness Pentecostal movement that calls it the ‘initial evidence‘, and ask the question, “Does it actually match the biblical model they claim to be following?”

Looking at this scripture and theology of the Oneness Pentecostal religion under the microscope of Scripture we find a virus or an infection in the teaching. To claim that the ‘gift of the Holy Ghost’ is a repetition of the Acts 2 upper room experience doesn’t line up with the Word.

Having been in this religion for 15 years and being connected with hundreds and thousands of Oneness Pentecostals, I can tell you that no one, ever, received the ‘gift’ evidenced in the fashion of the upper room experience. It has never been preceded with a rushing mighty wind, never was it accompanied with cloven tongues visible to all around, and most importantly, NEVER was it a known language that was immediately recognized by someone surround the event.

The only argument to support the Oneness theology on this topic is to say, ‘it’s changed’. To express that it changed is to then dismantle the entire theology. To claim that it did not change is to then admit that they, and no one else is repeating the biblical event as exampled in Acts 2, and thus, have made up their own experience or are disobeying Scripture.

Conclusion

The conclusion is that the ‘gift of the Spirit’ is not the supposed initial evidence of speaking in tongues. In fact, Scripture makes it clear that the gift of the Spirit is the eternal promise (Ephesians 1:13) seal we receive upon believing in Christ. That the fruit of the spirit is the evidence of that gift, and finally, that the promise and hope of glory (Colossians 1:27) is the result of that gift.

Scripture also tells us that the ‘gift’ of God is free, and it is salvation. (Ephesians 2:8) Ephesians 4:7 tells us that each of us is given a measure of grace according to the gift of Christ. James 1:7 tells us that the gift is given by God and comes down from Him, who never changes.

We didn’t beg for this gift, we didn’t have to exert and stress and beg and scream and cry for it, we received it by faith! Freely we have been given this grace. In fact, 1 Peter 4:10 tells us that every man who has this gift is responsible for sharing and ministering the grace and freeness of God’s love to one another – being stewards of this gift.

As every man hath received the gift, even so minister the same one to another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God. ~ 1 Peter 4:10

Scripture never indicates that the gift is the event or outcome of speaking in tongues. This outlines both the falsity of the Oneness Pentecostal theology surrounding the Acts 2:38 narrative, but more important than any of that, illuminates the wonderful miracle of grace – that it was given to us freely, because of the obedience and love of Jesus Christ and that the real gift of the Holy Ghost is His presence with us, working for us and granting us the fruit of His Spirit, which is Love, Joy, Peace, Longsuffering, Gentleness, Goodness, Faith, Meekness, and Self-Control – against such God has no law!

Blessings

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What made Jesus mad?

It wasn’t the sinners. No, he ate dinner with them. What we see Jesus fighting against are the religious Pharisees who loved to point fingers at other people’s sin and shortcomings. Legalism. It is essentially the world system telling you that salvation is not a free gift and that you must work for your grace. Grace is a free gift. If it comes with ‘requirements’ is is no longer a gift, but a paycheck. Jesus came to save the world not condemn it. A lot of these issues come from people trying to make the Bible fit their opinions. They refuse to research culture, translations, Hebrew, Greek, etc.. They fall under the influence of the adversary and believe we are not worthy of God’s acceptance unless we perform. God loves you; you have to switch your focus from you and onto what He did (and is) doing for us. By saying a dress, long hair, no jewelry, and no makeup is required to get into Heaven, you have rejected the power of Jesus dying and resurrecting by saying – No God, I think I got this. No thanks, I can save myself. However, it isn’t about us. It is all about HIM and what HE did for us.

It. Is. That. Simple.That is the GOOD NEWS!

Let’s take a look at the scriptures and see what they say.

In Matthew 23:27, Jesus addressed the Pharisees who were being judgmental and holding on to a ‘visual and works-based’ salvation by saying, “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which appear beautiful on the outside, but inside are full of dead men’s bones and every impurity. In the same way, on the outside you seem righteous to people, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.” This statement was radical then and it still is today! What good is it if we visually look ‘set apart’ but we are bitter, prideful, and show no love? That is what Jesus means by a whitewashed tomb! Jesus also declares the Pharisees hypocrites for straining out a gnat but eating a camel (Matt. 23:24). This was a parable about worrying about small things but yet, you are full of hatred and pride – which are BIG issues. We must cleans our hearts. As we do this, we will reflect Christ on the outside by our actions. We are becoming love. It isn’t a checklist, it is a process; one that can take years as we begin to heal the many layers of shame, guilt, and pain that we have endured. We must have faith. Believing in something we cannot….see.

We tend to think of a Pharisee as just a Jewish person who didn’t accept Jesus as the Messiah. Why did they reject Him? Jesus was viewed as radical. His message was a 360 from the Law of Moses (Read the book of Leviticus). Moses taught you must perform a certain way to be clean. Jesus taught that God already sees us as clean and we will have eternal life if we accept Him into our hearts as our Lord and Savior. There are many more accounts recorded in the New Testament where Jesus denounced the religious hypocrites, but I would like to now focus on the gospel. The good news. We cannot follow something we do not….know. The good news is that God already loves us and he loves us with agape love. Agape love is unconditional love. Meaning, there are no conditions in which we can make God love us more or less. He loves us because He is love. Scripture tells us this.

1 John 4:8 “The one who does not love does not know God, because God is love.”

Romans 8:39 tells us that nothing can separate us from love. Nothing. Not your skirt that is above your knees, your short hair, your bitterness, your lies….NOTHING. It is written, “(No) height or depth, or any other created thing will have the power to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord!” Praise God for that because it is impossible to be sinless, but fear not! We are loved by God and we have been bought and paid for.

John 17:23 “I am in them and You are in Me. May they be made completely one, so the world may know You have sent Me and have loved them as You have loved Me.” This right here tells us we are loved the same way Jesus is loved. Hallelujah!

Ephesians 1:7-8 “We have redemption in Him through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace that He lavished on us with all wisdom and understanding.” He has redeemed us! We are set free.

1 Corinthians 12:13 “For we were all baptized by one Spirit into one body—whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free—and we were all made to drink of one Spirit.” God does not see a sinner when He looks at us. We have been baptized into Christ.

While we have this good news, so many people reject it. It is difficult for the human mind to grasp this concept that we are loved unconditionally by God. Another argument I have heard time and time again is that the God of the Old Testament was mean and full of wrath. Yes, people were killed, but the Bible is not a book of condemnation, it is a book about God’s redemption plan to save mankind after the fall. The only reason people were wiped away was due to their motives to wipe out the line to Jesus Christ. God had to preserve that at all costs because Jesus is the ONLY way to eternal life without pain and suffering.

If God was mad at us, why did he make a promise to Abraham that he would use his seed to bless the world? God made this promise in the very first book of the Bible. He wouldn’t do this if He regretted creating us. He promised Abraham, Issac, and Jacob (Israel) that He would redeem us through their bloodline. We now know that redemption plan was finished with Jesus Christ. The adversary tricked Adam and Eve to eat from the Tree of Good and Evil by making them feel God was hiding something from them. After the fall, they felt shame and guilt. Something God never wanted for us. The reason we felt naked was because of the enemy. Not God. We clothe ourselves to hide shame. If it was Satan who told us we were unclean in the garden, is it not Satan who is inside your head telling you that you are unclean if you don’t perform or wear certain types of attire?

One last thought. Fear in Hebrew does not translate to being scared. To fear God in the original text means to have childlike wonder and awe of God. Fear = awe. How easily we can get tricked into thinking God is angry with us. Satan has done this since the fall. The devil is the father of all lies and he knows no new tricks.

The good news is that the battle has been won. Jesus conquered the grave. We have redemption through Jesus Christ and we are covered by the blood of the lamb. Stop listening to the lies of the enemy. Read the word for yourself, rather than believing everything another human tells you. You can even question me and what I have written here in this article. Actually, I encourage you to. Seek to find the truth! The Holy Spirit will slowly reveal it if you ask for it.

We are no longer slaves. Thank you Jesus for this unconditional, undeserved gift of grace and eternal life.

Let your Kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as is it in Heaven. Until you return, I will praise You and spread this wonderful, life-giving news of how You died for me, and…..the world. I pray that every person who reads this will be filled with a seed of Truth. In Jesus’ name I declare this. Amen.

–GodIsLove

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Woe to Me or Woe to You?

Last Sunday’s readings used in many liturgical churches included 1 Corinthians 9:16-23. In all honesty, what sticks out for me the most when I encounter this passage isn’t anything I associate with something preached from a pulpit. Rather, it’s a heated online exchange that I was involved in shortly after getting online and discovering the world of Internet message boards (I guess I’m dating myself here).

In 1998, I was in high school and frequented a site called The Student Center geared towards high school and college students, which is now defunct. There were some interesting discussions there, and I even made an online friend I’m still in touch with. There were also some true “live ones” there, too.

Having been raised nominally Episcopalian and confirmed as one, my exposure to fundamentalism had been very limited. This board had attracted several evangelical and fundamentalist posters who were very militant about belief in a pre-millenial rapture and dispensationalism. There were also a few posters affiliated with a college campus ministry who were very adamant about pushing a need for a personal conversion experience that attacked virtually every expression of faith besides the ministry’s own.

I wasn’t going to lightly take being told I was a hell-bound apostate for not being a pre-millenialist or that I was lost because I wasn’t affiliated with their ministry. After taking so much of that, I told them why I didn’t buy into their thinking, and the message board literally lit up. Most others stayed out of the fray altogether or were at least curious about different views, but a few persisted in keeping the back-and-forth going.

Back then, I had a lot less restraint in dealing with difficult people online than I do now. Part of what worsened the overall encounter was when one of the posters accused me of having a “warped theology” and proclaiming “Woe to you, IrishLass, you are not preaching the Gospel.” Whoa, who, whoa – wait a minute people! – whose Gospel are you talking about?

I think this exchange was a classic example of proof-texting and taking a verse WAY out of context. These message board posters equated the Gospel with their own sectarian beliefs about the end-times, not the universal message of grace and reconciliation. Were I to encounter these people again, I would be glad to remind them of the words of John 3:16-17 and Romans 8:31-39, among others.

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Coping with the Cults – Part #1 – Separation

Since leaving a cult, I have delved into studying, writing, reading, talking and coping with the very real, sometimes hidden, but obvious affects cults and their teachings have on lives. Most certainly the very word ‘cult’ conjures up the worst horrors to hit the news headlines, like Jonestown, or Waco, TX, but the majority of cults are far less obvious, and insidiously covert, and right next door.

The most common question I am asked, the top concern and hurt I see through my YouTube channel, this blog, interviews and online groups, is ‘How do I cope with the pain of all those I loved who now reject me, simply because I no longer go to church there?’

This series on Coping with the Cults will be focused on addressing the real and emotional outcomes that are a result of being a member of, or being affected by someone who is in a cult. But before we move on, I want to address the word cult and what I mean when I say it.

What is a cult?

1. The word itself has a few different social meanings. We have heard the phrase ‘cult following’ around a brand, a product, even a movie. Even Netflix has a section called Cult Sci-Fi & Fantasy. That is to say, these movies have a large fan base. Products like Apple can be referred to as the Apple Cult.

In this sense of the word, cult simply means something that is loved and/or adored by others.

2. The second most common definition of cult is a religion. Christianity, from its very beginning was considered to be a cult by Judaism and the Romans who occupied Jerusalem at the time of Jesus. That is to say, a religious cult is a religious movement or organization that differs dramatically from the social normative of religion in the time and environment the group was formed in.

Christianity of its time was considered to be a cult.

3. Today’s most common understanding of the word cult, and what I mean when I say it, is a religious organization that exhibits the following major characteristics at the very foundation of the belief structure:

Exclusive – They are the only ones ‘with the truth,’ and often use phrases such as ‘coming into the truth’, or ‘leaving the truth.’ You must be in their organization and share exactly their beliefs in order to gain salvation, and leaving the organization is often hard, painful and doing so labels you as apostate.
Secretive – These groups will internally teach doctrines, beliefs and practices that they do not share publicly, knowing that the knowledge would create ridicule and scare away new converts before indoctrination and take away the shock of the beliefs. They may also have sacred texts or writings that only upper echelon member are privy too.
Authoritarian – The biggest and most insidious aspect to religious organizations known as cults is their practice of gathering around a single, often charismatic human leader who through indoctrination, brain washing and often outright demands, requires absolute and unwavering loyalty and obedience by his/her followers. This is often displayed by members becoming aggravated and potentially violent towards any who oppose the leaders teachings.

This third example is the type of church I attended for fifteen years and what I, and the majority of the world that studies cults, would define as a cult.

A young man from the very same church I left asked the pastor there if he could marry a young lady in the church. Because this young man had been asking questions about the doctrines of the church, the pastor told him no. He was told;

“Until I feel your unwavering loyalty, I will not give you one of my girls.”

This is a cult. One in which your privileges in life are at the permission of the leader. An organization that makes you believe that you must cut off family, friends and other associations in order to be in right standing with them. A belief system that makes you guard what you tell people about it, is most definitely a cult.

What happens when you leave a cult? Separation

Disfellowshipped, cast aside as chaff, purged wickedness. Separation.

If you decide of your own volition to leave a cult, you are one of the few. And if you are told you had to leave the church, the result is the same. As a matter of fact, this is so important to some religious organizations that follow this definition of a cult, they have entire web pages dedicated to teaching their followers how to cope with Disfellowshipping their own children.

The Jehovah’s Witness organization is one such group that fits this mold and puts a lot of effort, like the Mormon faith, into teaching their followers the art of separating from those who no longer believe ‘the faith,’ or as little as ‘break the rules’.

This article, entitled God’s Love – How to treat disfellowshipped people?, goes on to declare that strict avoidance and abandonment of a disfellowshipped person is necessary to prove ones loyalty to God, even if it is your children.

In this article, Why Disfellowshipping Is a Loving Provision, they try to show how Julian dealt with the Church declaring his son an outlaw, disfellowshipped and to be shunned. His Son.

“What Jehovah expects of us is reasonable and is a protection for us. For example, we all want to live among peaceful, decent, and honest people, and that is what we experience among our spiritual brothers and sisters. Why are they this way? Because they dedicated themselves to Jehovah and promised to live by what he says in the Bible.

How stark a contrast these teachings are to the power of love given to us by Christ.

John 8:7 So when they continued asking him, he lifted up himself, and said unto them, He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.
John 8:10 When Jesus had lifted up himself, and saw none but the woman, he said unto her, Woman, where are those thine accusers? hath no man condemned thee?
John 8:11 She said, No man, Lord. And Jesus said unto her, Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more.

What a different story! The example from the Jehovah’s Witness web page, and my old Oneness Apostolic Pentecostal cult said, ‘get right, perfect yourself, cleanse the sin, and then we will accept you!’ But Jesus said, “I’ve already accepted you in your sin, and I do not judge or condemn you, let that be the reason you cleanse yourself from sin.”

But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. – Romans 5:8, KJV

How to cope with separation?

This is for most, the hardest and most crucial moment in escaping from a cult, and retaining their faith in a loving God. It would be all too easy to say, ‘Why would God allow something like this to happen?’ and abandon faith. To let the pendulum swing to the other extreme.

We’ve probably all heard someone say, and maybe the preacher, ‘Would God allow us to have growth and revival if HE wasn’t in what we are doing?’ as if that proved the validity of their systems. To that I would ask, why is the Muslim faith the fastest growing religious organization on the planet? Is God in it?

In the book, The Subtle Power of Spiritual Abuse, it ends with something I wasn’t expecting when I first read it, fresh after leaving the cult. The authors, David Johnson and Jeff VanVonderen, said leaving a spiritually abusive system was like leaving a physically abusive relationship, or leaving a drug addiction. It would take recovery.

Recovery? I shuddered. I left it, what did I have to recover from?

Bitterness for sure. To have the sudden realization that those whom you called friend, and even loved ones, turned from you simply because you decided to no longer attend a church. Not that you left God, became a robber and a murderer, or blasphemed God, you just left that address, or building. Can friendship be that cheap? Their responses will be, ‘You’re the one who left.’

Fear daily. What if they were right? What if the curses of God are about to crash down on me? Did I make a mistake? Will they ever talk to me again? I don’t have any friends now. What will my family say about me?

Anger at the system. Anger at those who follow the system. Mostly, angry at yourself for being so gullible and stupid. How could I have been so weak and stupid to let them control me like that?

When I read this I nearly broke out in tears. It was true. I was really angry, and I could easily take it out on others, but I was really angry with myself. That I would allow another human being with no gun to my head to control me so utterly. I felt like my manhood was ripped away. Really small, you know?

And then they said, this is how a drug addict feels. That small pill, the little bottle. The tiny droplet, or small pile of white powder. It had absolute control over them. And they felt stupid.

In the book Toxic Faith by Stephen Arterburn and Jack Felton, they describe spiritual abuse like physical abuse, in that humanity tends to cling to the abuse if it is all they have known, because the unknown somehow seems more painful.

What a vicious cycle it is, and I believe God alone has judgement for the propagators of this hate.

The only way to Cope with the Cults, and the separation that follows, is to get help!

Consider this list of the top five steps you must take after a marital separation and see how it applies to Coping with the Cults.

Recognize that it’s OK to have different feelings
Give yourself a break
Don’t go through this alone
Take care of yourself emotionally and physically
Avoid power struggles and arguments with your ex-church fellowship

#5 originally read, “Avoid power struggles and arguments with your spouse or former spouse.”

This is poignant because when you buy in to a cult, you are marrying the system. You are not just someone who attends, but you are a member. You have committed to being one with the organization; you are, in all intents and purposes, betrothed. And separation from that is painful and has long term tremors.

You can, and you will recover! You will find support, and new friends, a fresh start, the life God intended you to live. It may take months, and in some cases, there are those who have been out for years that still face the struggle.

But God has better plans for you! You can Cope with the Cult that dogs you in the shadows of your mind, because God is not the author of confusion. Life was never intended to be a closet society on the fringe edge of normality.

You did escape, and you can escape, and you will recover, if you realize you were NOT STUPID, you are human. You are OK to have different feelings. You will not be hard on yourself for the past, and you most certainly will not do this alone. You will take care of yourself, free from the judgementalism of your past, and you, not in the spirit of separation, but in the spirit of love and recovery, will not endanger yourself by becoming embroiled in arguments and power struggles with those who would condemn you.

Remember the words of Christ as you go on in victory, Coping with the Cults.

Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more.

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