Category: distorted view of God | Page 5

Scrupulosity – Obsessive fear of sinning – You are not crazy!

Scrupulosity is a form of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) that relates to religious/moral obsessions. The person suffering is overly concerned that something they thought or did might be a sin or another violation of doctrine. Scrupulosity has been the story of my life, since a young age. It was such a relief to find that it had a name, that I wasn’t crazy.

I discovered this about three years ago – three years after leaving the sect. I have a genetic and environmental tendency towards depression and anxiety, and other mental illnesses. From a young age I was obsessed about hell – and not going there. I think that sects and cults and other high-control groups that operate on shame, fear, and control are catalysts to produce large numbers of people who suffer from scrupulosity. They suffer mostly in secret. I try to spread the word about this type of OCD whenever I encounter someone who has been damaged by religion.

The severity of my symptoms diminished by about 80% when I discovered that other people also suffer in this way, and that I am not inherently evil and wicked for having such thoughts and fears. Wikipedia says “It is personally distressing, objectively dysfunctional, and often accompanied by significant impairment in social functioning.” This is a very accurate description.

My main obsession was that I was not saved eternally because of some unconscious sin that I’d not repented of. Or because of the intrusive thoughts that accused me of things like “do you really love God in your heart? Maybe you just intellectually love him?” The intrusive thoughts were destructive and always accusing me of being the worst and most disgusting sinner – unworthy of love and grace because I wasn’t perfect. (Caused by hearing a perverted version of the Gospel). It caused me to repeat the sinner’s prayer obsessively; question whether God was truly a God of love; fear praying to God because he was so big and scary and had the ability to banish me to hell for eternity so I didn’t get warm and fuzzy thinking about him. I also secretly questioned His existence for most of my sect life.

If I could count the energy I spent obsessing about not being saved it would be a sad statistic. What a waste! I am convinced that toxic churches, that are about religion and not relationship, are the birthplace of scrupulosity. Especially when fire and brimstone are preached at toddlers, infants, and young children. In my sect there was no Sunday school, we all heard the same services. They naively think that “oh, the children can’t understand what is being said,” but this is not the case. My earliest memory of God is one of a hell-banishing-monster. My earliest impressions of God were not of a Father of love. Far from it.

The childhood emotions and psyche are not ready for such an onslaught of terrifying things. Youthful imaginations run wild and the monsters under the bed and behind the curtain get larger and larger until the child is already exhibiting signs of mental illness(es) at a young age. All in the name of God. Who in fact is love. And love is an opposing and opposite spiritual force to fear! How ironic.

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God, Our Heavenly Father

To many of us survivors of an abusive legalistic church environment, and the abuse from male dominant leadership, it can be difficult to trust organized religion and a God that was portrayed as one who was angry and ready to destroy you and send you to hell. It can also be detrimental to our hopes and dreams of having a close relationship with Almighty God.

I was not the good obedient child of God when I was actively involved in the United Pentecostal Church. I was always busy questioning the standards, rules, beliefs and researching and writing papers on my findings, and generally keeping the ministry in turmoil because I was uncovering truth and they knew I would eventually uncover what was being hidden. For example John 3:16; “For God so loved…He gave…” we only heard this scripture at Christmas and in its entirety.

I was one of those statistics who wasn’t raised in a home with a father figure full time. My parents were divorced. I saw my father and I loved him very much but when you only spend short periods of time with them it is not enough. My father was a fireman and worked crazy shifts but every time he came to my house he would show me an escape route if there was ever a fire. He remarried when I was 10 to a very nice woman and we developed a sweet relationship. They also blessed me with a little sister when I was 13; we are very close to this day. My dad and stepmom both passed away in 2011 and I still miss them both very much.

My mother remarried two times while I was growing up and they were harsh and abusive men. After the second time my brother and I asked her not to marry again until we were grown. I was 15 and my brother was 10 at that time and she didn’t remarry until I was 20. Of course by then she finally found a good man and he would have made a great father. He did become a father to me, even though I was grown, and a good grandfather to my children. They will celebrate 40 years this December and he has helped me through so many bad times and stood by my side. He never had kids of his own but he chose to be my dad and introduces me as his daughter.

One thing I found lacking in the teaching of the UPC was developing relationships of any kind and especially establishing a relationship with God. I was afraid of Him and I thought He was a God of judgement and not love. I would read the Bible and be so confused with the greetings in the epistles to God our Father. But I never knew Him as my Heavenly Father.

How sad that a beautiful facet of God’s character was not being explored. He is not a distant, impersonal ruler with an iron fist, but a warm and loving Father. But so often this is tainted by the weakness of human fathers. The foundational truth, God, in all His power and glory, is best understood as a loving, intimate Father. (Source)

Upon closer study of what makes a father, I made a list that shows what a natural or step father should be and correlated with God as a father according to scripture:

1. He is the source of life and creates life. (Genesis 1:27; Luke 1:30-35)
2. He loves us. (I John 4:16; John 3:16)
3. He provides for our needs. (Luke 12:22-32; Philippians 4:19)
4. He lovingly corrects us. (Proverbs 3:11)
5. He gives us His wisdom. (James 3:15-18)
6. He protects. (Psalm 21:8; Deuteronomy 31:8)
7. He welcomes us back. (Luke 15:22-24)
8. He gives good gifts. (Luke 11:9-13)
9. He wants us to enjoy life. (Romans 15:13)
10. He wants us to trust him. (Psalm 62:1-12) (Partial Source)

Many of us expect these attributes from our physical father, and of our husbands when we have our own children. I would say many fathers try to have these attributes but our Heavenly Father has them all, and this is just the tip of the iceberg!

Although God would like our earthly fathers to be the spiritual leaders in our home, most fathers fail at this, either from not being a born again believer or maybe working too much to provide for their families. But our Heavenly Father not only provides spiritual guidance, He can actually become our Father in a very personal way when we are spiritually born again. Romans 8:14 tells us, “For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons (and daughters) of God.” (Source)

Paul tells us in Romans 8:9, “You are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you.” Of course, we are still flesh, but Paul was speaking of this from God’s perspective. We begin our spiritual life as babies (1 Peter 2:2), but we are to grow and mature in Christ until our death or until Christ returns (1 Thessalonians 4:15-17). Through this new life based on God’s Spirit living in us, we can begin to not only grasp spiritual truths and values (1 Corinthians 2:9-11), but also have a very personal, close relationship with our Heavenly Father. (Source)

Now I always called my father “daddy” and I called my step father, “dad” but I’ve never called my Heavenly Father, daddy or dad. But in Romans 8:15, we are now his children through adoption and we are invited to call him “Abba” which means Daddy or Papa.

So this Father’s Day we have one more to honor, our Heavenly Father! We are free to say, Happy Father’s Day, Papa!!

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Rebuilding beliefs

One thing that’s common in leaving groups like my former one is that, in leaving, people have to rebuild everything they believe. They have to sort through what the group taught, what they agree with and what they don’t, what others teach and what they can accept as safe and true… it’s a lot to process, and many of us want to process it all fairly quickly. It leaves us in a state of not knowing what we believe… We disagree with the unhealthy group on a few points (ie that if we don’t attend their church we’re going to hell) but don’t know what we do believe on other points (certain staunch beliefs on things like baptism, worship styles, and communion were very much ingrained in me at my former church and were difficult to study out and accept others’ beliefs on).

Thankfully, there have been people I could safely pose questions to. “OK, my former church taught _____. Why do you teach _______?” has been a common theme. Another has been, “That word/phrase doesn’t mean to me what it does to you. Please explain what you mean without that term.” When I don’t have answers to these questions, I start getting depressed sometimes. I don’t want to pray and don’t want to go to church. I want to run far away from all of it. When someone takes the time to explain what they mean, and then change their wording slightly, the fear lessens dramatically. When I’m allowed the time to work through things and come to my own conclusions, when those conclusions are accepted, I am relieved. In those times I grow.

I’m guessing sometimes we know what we believe, but we haven’t realized it yet because we still see how much we have to sort out, how far we want to go, rather than how far we’ve come. And sometimes we just need a little definition and space to see things in a different way and to gain a healthier understanding.

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Sunday Night Fright Night

The stage was set, the tones were hushed, – weeping and moaning could be heard – and the sweat was pouring amid the hot summer breeze blowing through the open windows. We were reaching the climax of another “evangelistic” Sunday night service at my United Pentecostal Church. The building was small and inadequate for the crowds, as was the air conditioning system. Our pastor’s preaching style was starting slowly with a scripture, a title, and then launching into various Old Testament stories and ending with stories of car wrecks, God’s impending judgement on women who didn’t follow the rules, and those waiting too late to “pray back through.”

He was a very large, imposing man and he could be very dramatic in his sermons; visually displaying how the devil had his way with Job, as he scraped his sores. He acted out the stories of Rizpah, shooing away the vultures from the seven slaughtered sons of Saul, staggering back as poor Naomi who would have to be called Mara (meaning bitter) because she went out full and came back empty; no husband, no children, and of course pitiful blind Samson, who didn’t even know when God’s spirit left him. (This thought would haunt me for the rest of my life.)

All of these sermons were meant to create a sense of urgency in the audience to come rushing to the altar benches in front of the pews at the end of the service to plead with God for mercy one more time. This scene was repeated each Sunday night in my United Pentecostal Church. The purpose this served in my life was to make me very fearful of God and not the kind of fear the Bible describes. As a young girl, the first concepts taught to me about God were that of someone who would only love me if I was good enough. If not, He would yank the Spirit right out of me or maybe like Samson it would drift out and I wouldn’t even know it. The long term effect of living with this kind of fear in my life is that I have always taken on the guilt of everything. Every circumstance that comes in to my life causes me to question “is it my fault?” I even dream up circumstances to blame myself for. And since our emotions can’t think, they tend to stick with you through life despite the facts that you know.

Fear and guilt are used as a means of gaining control over the members of these churches. You see, these are not the meek and mild ministers you see in movies, they are in total control. In fact, the churches in the area I am in are not even called by their name but by Brother So and So’s church; whoever the pastor is at the time. You are not to question his authority. These ministers make up strict behavioral rules for you to obey; how to dress and how to comb your hair. If you are going to be allowed to participate you must be following the rules.

Those who don’t follow the rules are disapproved of and seen as the dreaded “worldly.” We were told what we could listen to, where we could go, and what we could do. Fear is used to keep people from leaving the church; you are told there is no alternative, if you leave here you will lose your salvation. It was always stressed that your “church family” is really closer to you than your real family. Why would you ever leave?

But, is this God’s approach to drawing people to Himself? If God’s highest desire is for man’s love and obedience, is it won based on fear of punishment? The answer is no. God’s approach to win man’s love and obedience is love.

“…not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance?” Romans 2:4b NKJV

“For God so loved the world…John 3:16a NKJV

“But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us,even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.” Ephesians 2:4-7 NKJV

^“For the love of Christ compels us…” II Corinthians 5: 14a NKJV

Shattered worlds

I sat in a membership class at a church–not planning to become a member, but it’s a good way to figure out what they are really thinking. A lot comes out in membership classes that aren’t discussed on Sunday mornings.

And this class was on church community… and church discipline. I was expecting to be guarded. I wasn’t expecting the leader to begin by making a list of all the things we hold dear (family, friends, God, etc) and then reordering them so that there was a cross (to represent Jesus) in the middle and all the other things (family, friends, etc) around it. And I realized what went most terribly wrong: when Jesus and a church group or doctrine are too closely combined and Jesus/church becomes the nucleus of your life and most of your friends, family, etc, are in that church too… when something goes wrong in that church it doesn’t just make you redirect and refocus on Jesus. It blows your world apart.

I started shaking. I couldn’t stop. I don’t think I was shaking hard enough for others to notice… at least I hope. But then there was the second ‘hit’… church discipline. And I started shaking harder. Nothing was said that raised any red flags; there were actually things said that were surprisingly healthy. I also suspect that there were things not said, but that could be more my lack of trust in anyone or any entity that says those words.

Everyone disappeared afterward, so I am OK. But the idea that it wasn’t just that church fell apart, but that my world was shattered when I left… that is both helpful and frightening. Too many churches end up being the center of people’s lives along with Jesus. And that’s not good. Not good at all.