Category: leaving | Page 7 | Spiritual Abuse Blogs

Eating the Forbidden Fruit of Truth Part 4

Continued from Part 3.

Having tasted the forbidden fruit of truth, I couldn’t close my eyes ever again. Action needed to be done. I worked on a reform proposal during the deployment, and I arranged a meeting with the pastor upon my return. I first went home on leave.

During my time home, I suffered an emotional meltdown. I was overwhelmed with the realization those whom I trusted the most lied to me about the most important things. I returned rested and recovered. The pastor left his desk and actually sat in the chair next to me – something he rarely did. The pastor then informed me my reform proposal was rejected in its entirety. I was floored. I thought for sure because I had been involved with the ministry as long as I had, plus was considered an elder, the leadership would listen to me. I was dead wrong.

A few months would pass before I finally found my exit. While I waited, I continued to read and interact with those on the website, realizing I couldn’t continue the charade of being in a ministry built on corruption and lies.

My moment came on March 19, 2003. A church meeting was held where we were all issued 3×5 cards where we were to mark YES or NO concerning our confidence in the leadership. I wrestled with the decision, but I believe at that instant God told me to write NO on the 3×5 card. It was time to leave.

Truth isn’t always pleasant. At the same time, truth is liberating. I have no regrets eating that forbidden fruit.

Rescuing Randy is one mother’s story about the harm caused by L.R. Davis, who started as a United Pentecostal Church minister.

Eating the Forbidden Fruit of Truth Part 1
Eating the Forbidden Fruit of Truth Part 2

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Eating the Forbidden Fruit of Truth Part 3

Continued from Part 2.

September 11, 2001. Anyone old enough to remember knew where they were that day. I was aboard ship, and heard the order to go underway; I would be deployed for seven months, most of that time in the Indian Ocean.

A few months into the deployment, the woman who created the website with her husband reported aboard the same ship where I was stationed. Almost immediately shipmates approached me, wanting to know why we were so polarized when we attended the same church and believed very much the same things. I prayed about talking to her because I wanted answers.

What was intended to be a brief Q and A session became a two hour conversation that opened my eyes to the ugly truth about the founder. She told me how, during her shore duty tour, she was able to obtain a copy of the court records concerning the founder’s trial and conviction. I listened closely as she shared of how the founder allegedly attacked her husband when he was a single man in the church. I could tell she wasn’t lying to me.

I realized I could no longer defend the founder anymore. I read through the court records, and my mind was blown. So many people whom I thought were pillars in the church were implicated in the closed door activities. I couldn’t believe it at first, but the truth was there in stark black and white. I had been duped into thinking we were such a holy bunch, but in reality there were two groups within the church. There was the majority, who made the church look wonderful on the outside. Then there was this – the dark inner circle where all the secrets and lies were kept.

What was I going to do with this knowledge?

Eating the Forbidden Fruit of Truth Part 1

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Eating the Forbidden Fruit of Truth Part 2

Continued from Part 1.

I read the website with great interest. I personally knew the husband and wife, and deep down I knew they were decent people. I just didn’t understand at the time how they could speak so much against a ministry we were told was on fire for the gospel and we were commissioned to carry the Good News to the world.

On days I was tasked with working at the church office, I played the obedient servant role to a T. I never once accessed the website at church, only at home or aboard ship. I did, however, witness the pastor’s wife reading through it intently. I never asked her why she was so interested. I don’t believe at that time anyone in the church suspected I was looking for answers in forbidden places.

My quest for answers took a new turn while home on leave. The forbidden website opened message boards where I could create a username and participate. Using an alias, I began to communicate on the boards and interacted with other former members. I saw a consistency in their testimonies that I couldn’t deny. I also noticed they too were people I considered close friends. What caused them all to leave?

The pastors would tell us Satan deceived those who left, and they believed a lie about the ministry just as the apostle Paul said concerning “strong delusion.” It didn’t matter. I still had a desire to know more.

The events after September 11 would set me up for a meeting that would lead to my eventual departure from the church where I labored for almost 17 years.

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Working With Other Abuse Victims

As I continue my walk with God after leaving the abusive church environment, I learn that I am definitely not alone. There are other groups and people who share common experiences despite differences in church doctrine and teaching.

Some of the people I meet are supportive. We become friends and share much information, seeing the kindred spirit that draws us together. We know our faith must be in Jesus, not just in a man or organization. This is a blessing for me and helps me hold fast the profession of faith, even when I don’t have a church home.

Has every former member I met been happy to see me? Sadly, no. This is especially true with two guys I actually invited to my former church. They saw through the smoke and mirrors and got out of Dodge before I did, and to this day refused all attempts to reach them. In their cases, the road to healing may have required a clean and total break from the past, including anyone from the previous church. I wish them well and pray peace will come to them.

Other former members in different groups can get dicey at times. One group I was active in for almost three years was fervent in reporting corruption in the organized church; I was a regular blogger and contributor to much of their success. It seemed like this was a good project, and we were marching forward like Christian soldiers against a corrupt system.

This particular group morphed into something I couldn’t support anymore and I had to leave. The group’s founder quit for personal reasons, possibly burnout. The people who succeeded him injected politics in the discussion, something I wished not to do. I felt the political discussions were divisive and detracted from the original vision of helping others see there is more to God than just inside churches.

The final straw happened following the presidential election in 2016. I hung on for a couple months following President Trump’s inauguration, but the political divide (I am a Republican, most of the other former church members were Democrats.) drove a wedge between us. I once again had to leave a group I invested time and energy in.

As we meet others who left abusive groups, we need to be careful not to inject elements from our past experiences that could cause division or open wounds in others. We especially need to be careful not to become what we left behind.

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Does God punish those who leave abusive churches? pt 2

There were several passages that helped me maintain my sanity after leaving an unhealthy church. One of those has become a theme in my life. It’s long, but there’s so much in it. The gist is this:

John 9:13 They brought to the Pharisees the man who had been blind. 14 Now the day on which Jesus had made the mud and opened the man’s eyes was a Sabbath. 15 Therefore the Pharisees also asked him how he had received his sight. “He put mud on my eyes,” the man replied, “and I washed, and now I see.”
16 Some of the Pharisees said, “This man is not from God, for he does not keep the Sabbath.”… [so they asked his parents if this was their son who’d been blind] 20 “We know he is our son,” the parents answered, “and we know he was born blind. 21 But how he can see now, or who opened his eyes, we don’t know. Ask him. He is of age; he will speak for himself.” 22 His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jewish leaders, who already had decided that anyone who acknowledged that Jesus was the Messiah would be put out of the synagogue. 23 That was why his parents said, “He is of age; ask him.”
24 A second time they summoned the man who had been blind. “Give glory to God by telling the truth,” they said. “We know this man is a sinner.”
25 He replied, “Whether he is a sinner or not, I don’t know. One thing I do know. I was blind but now I see!”
…28 Then they hurled insults at him and said, “You are this fellow’s disciple! We are disciples of Moses! 29 We know that God spoke to Moses, but as for this fellow, we don’t even know where he comes from.”…
[the formerly blind man answered them] 34 To this they replied, “You were steeped in sin at birth; how dare you lecture us!” And they threw him out.
35 Jesus heard that they had thrown him out, and when he found him, he said, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?”
36 “Who is he, sir?” the man asked. “Tell me so that I may believe in him.”
37 Jesus said, “You have now seen him; in fact, he is the one speaking with you.”
38 Then the man said, “Lord, I believe,” and he worshiped him.

And so… we have a group of Pharisees that is sure Jesus is a sinner because he didn’t follow their rules, even though what he did was very good and miraculous. In their minds healing a blind man was bad because it was done on the wrong day. So they questioned the blind man. They didn’t quite believe he had been blind at first. (They’d walked by him surely, but they hadn’t really noticed him, perhaps. That in itself says a whole lot.) Then they were upset that he really had been blind and that “this sinner” (Jesus) had healed him on *gasp* the Sabbath. The parents were afraid to answer because they might be kicked out of the temple. The man had to stand alone. Not even his parents would back him just in saying Jesus healed him! They insulted him. He answered amazingly wisely. They accused him of being born in sin and threw him out of the temple. They kicked him out! And Jesus came to him. This is the only passage in the Bible where Jesus went back to someone he’d healed. Some went back to Jesus, but this is the only person the Bible says Jesus went back to… and one of the only people Jesus revealed himself to by saying who he was so directly.

Jesus has a special care, I believe, for those who were spiritually abused. He understands the depth of that hurt and the confusion of the aftermath of spiritual abuse. And he cares, in a deep, gentle, loving way.

Does God punish those who leave abusive churches? Part 1

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