Category: holiness standards | Page 24

After Hardship Comes Ease

Verily, after hardship comes ease. ~ Quran 94:6.

What we are not told is that the “ease” after we leave an abusive church (or other situation) may be awhile coming. It does not (usually) happen the moment we walk out the door of that church.

I think the “ease” comes once we can start to forgive people for what they did to us and our families. That can take a long time sometimes. For me I am still working on it. Distance in time between me and the time I left (November 2012) is making things easier. Once I stepped away from that group of people and got my mind started thinking without the United Pentecostal Church glasses on, things seemed better.

One thing for me was that the last couple of years I was thinking “Where is Jesus in all of this?” I was losing sight of my Savior and was believing that the whole church had lost sight of him too. Preaching seemed to be all about hair, clothes, standards, tithing. Things that have nothing to do with salvation. I realized that I had bitten into the apple of a belief system that was not healthy. Gossip was rampant. People strived to be like the Pastor or his wife, not like Jesus. It was automatically thought that if you leave the building, The Church, you are leaving God. Because God can only live in a church where “All the Truth” is told. It isn’t so.

I left to reconnect with God. To see Him the way I did before I joined this cultish religion. Once out of the confines of a place I once thought of as a safe haven, a place to be with God, I discovered once again that He is everywhere all at once all the time.

Yes, things are getting easier day by day. But I still have more of my road to travel.

Leaving Church

Over the past few years, I’ve looked at several of the various oddities within this church, the conservative movement I was a part of, and Pentecost as a whole. No one would answer my questions for a long time. The answer was always to go ask the pastor. When I asked the pastor I was told that I was rebellious or thought I was smarter than him. I was expected to accept what was preached as gospel, and never look to the gospel or the God of the gospel for answers beyond the pulpit.

I hope these are anomalies- that they are not common in Pentecost. But the more I have read, the more I realize that I’m not alone in my experiences.

For a long time I refused to consider leaving the church, because they preached Jesus name baptism, Holy Ghost, and holiness of dress. But questions about other teachings started creeping into my mind. After two separate incidents, a year apart, when I was accused and charged guilty of something without being given a chance to explain (or in the second case to even know what they were talking about), I started looking into the scriptures more thoroughly. I stopped reading the Bible, but if something seemed strange, I’d reference the passage and read it in several versions if need be.

Several things began to disturb me:

The belief that the pastor was always right, and that he could not be questioned.
The concept that if the pastor said to do something, it must be done.
Preference of one person over another.
Letting down on standards held for decades, while still arguing that others (who used the same reasons for letting down on other things) were wrong.
Making women lesser saints.
Not allowing women to be as involved.
Catch phrases that demanded a shout.
Rebukes for not shouting on catch phrases, or not shouting enough.
Meaningless songs with a few words repeated over and over and over and…

It’s sad, really. I didn’t want to leave, and I never thought I would stop believing certain things. I’ve wondered if I would have been better off if I’d left months or years ago when the problems started. I miss my church friends, but there weren’t that many of them. I miss church activities to a degree. But I’m not sad to leave.

I wonder what will happen now, where I’ll go or what I’ll do. Will there be a church I feel comfortable in? Where? When? Should I take time off from church or plow back into it? Should I go to a Oneness church or just let that go? Will I ever be able to marry now that I’ve left? Will I put too much emphasis on a new pastor, following the old, ingrained rules?

There are no answers to these questions, but I’m satisfied. At first after leaving I crammed on books about exit and spiritual abuse. I don’t feel like doing that now. Maybe I should- I’ve been told it takes years to work through the problems. Maybe I just wasn’t treated that badly, or maybe its just that somewhere I still believe that I’m not leaving God just because I walk out the doors of a particular church.

In that particular way, I feel miles ahead of the ministers and saints I’ve talked to. Almost all of them think I need a pastor and need this church. Not so. I need God. And my pastor is not my god, and my church is not my god. My God fills the universe, but also stepped into time and was crucified to a cross… and rose again. His grace is sufficient, and I’ll trust Him.

Video

I prayed through in a church where TV “in the home” was preached against. However, the pastor admitted to having gone to friends’ homes to watch TV as a kid. He also allowed the saints to have a VCR and monitor. He even eventually got one. I watched more PG movies in the six months after I got in church than I had in the world. Many of us would also go to places like Walmart and watch movies there.

Later, another pastor ended up teaching against TV, video, moving pictures, monitors- I wasn’t even sure it was acceptable to go to a play. So here is what’s funny to me: There could be no VCRs, movies, or TV. Sometimes YouTube was also preached against. But at least some would watch video clips online at work regularly. Several emailed me video clips, too. And video games that look exactly like cartoons were never taught against at all.

I’m a very visual person. To me, video is an art form, if done tastefully. But I didn’t watch a movie or TV for years because it was ‘wrong.’ Not biblically wrong, pastorally wrong.

I don’t have a pastor now. Yesterday I checked out three videos from the library. Last night was the first time in my life I’d ever watched a video in my own home. And I cried. I don’t even know why. It wasn’t that I felt guilty. Maybe I was so relieved to be able to chose to do something just for the enjoyment of it. It was a beautiful movie. And it felt so nice to be able to just do something for the fun of it!

I’ve heard video preached against because we remember so much of what we see. However, we must remember that not everything we see is bad.

Do we truly remember more of a video than we do of real life? It may seem that way at first, but in reality, we haven’t- it’s just that in real life we remember snapshots of scenes. The best movies are simply limited to a well-directed series of these types of snapshots. This creates an illusion of remembering more from the movie than real life, when in fact we are still just remembering snapshots of the best pieces of life.

I will set no wicked thing before mine eyes: I hate the work of them that turn aside; it shall not cleave to me. (Ps 101:3) Obviously no verse in the Bible speaks specifically against television or movies. However, this verse has been used in many circles to show people they should not watch movies or TV. We should, indeed, be careful not to engross ourselves in anything that is wicked- book, TV, movie, everyday life… but if we used this verse to say that TV or movies on the whole were wrong, then we would need to go through life with our eyes closed. Those who walk with their eyes closed are most likely to fall.

Going to church

I went to a Baptist church and a Nazarene church this morning… mainly because the roads were bad and they weren’t that far apart, and partly because I was curious how they were different and similar. As my sister noted in an e-mail, each church, no matter the denomination, is different. So my experiences in these two doesn’t mean I think anything particularly about the denominations; these were just two churches I happened to go to.

One thing I have been surprised by is that church is boring. *blush* I haven’t sat in a service where one person was doing all the talking for almost two decades- stand, dance, hop, leap, kneel, clap, say “amen” and “preach,” yes, but not sit. None of the services I’ve been in so far are very, ah, interactive…

Neither of the churches today had ushers. Neither seemed to take attendance. Whew! I like that! One had several Pentecostal type actions and words- raised hands and such, the other had none. Both had a group of four to five people get up on the platform and sing all the songs, both had projectors with words on them. (I’ve seen this at every non-Pentecostal church I’ve been in recently.) Both had loooonnngggg prayers… I have to laugh to myself; I’m guessing I could get my sweet hour of prayer in just by attending an hour and a half denominational service! Pentecostals take prayer requests for longer, but these people pray, in minute detail, about every request. It isn’t just, “Oh, God, you know the needs! Thank you Jesus! Hallelujah! Amen!” They seriously pray for their requests- every one. I really like that. They act like they really believe every need and every person lifted up is important. I like that.

One, the preacher was kind of in charge even when he wasn’t leading, and in the other, the pastor actually made a joke about how it was OK to have him for lunch if people wanted to, and that people could correct him if they wanted to, as well. He seemed almost *gasp* human!

Every Pentecostal I know that will speak to me tells me I should “get back in church.” I know they would disagree with me about going to a Trinitarian church. That bothers me. I like a lot of things about Pentecostal worship and praise. I even enjoyed ‘holiness standards‘ and teachings on Jesus’ name baptism and such. I miss some things.

But in Pentecost I’ve missed the old, meaningful hymns like the ones sung this morning, people being able to accept each other in their humanity, the freedom to make choices on my own without rebuke, and preaching on things like grace, mercy, and love, too. I need those right now. Pentecostal style worship and praise I can do at home. I’ve got enough preaching CDs that if I really want an Apostolic message on baptism, I can listen to one any time. And standards are my choice. So I’m glad that, at least for a while, I can be bored! 🙂

Faith, Hope, Love

There is a children’s song that goes: Have faith, hope, and charity, that’s the way to live successfully. How do I know the Bible tells me so….

I think one of the most devastating attributes of an unhealthy, legalistic church is that they weaken ones faith, take away hope and contaminate love.

Faith that begins as a result of acknowledging amazing grace, soon weakens when taught to rely on performance or adherence to arbitrary standards as a gauge of salvational standing.

Hope that begins with a belief that all things are possible is limited severely when tied to a dependence on human performance or actions seen as directly impacting ones status or relationship with God.

Finally love that begins as an all consuming feeling of caring, kindness, and a desire to give to others as you experienced the love of the almighty is corrupted by an attitude of self righteous judgement that permeates the entire movement in these legalistic, performance based, unhealthy church organizations.

I can remember a time as a new believer when nothing was seen as a negative. Lack of money or possessions just held little importance compared to the knowledge that God was real, He loved me and I had hope for eternity.

Then, as time passed, the cares of life- spouse, children, elderly parents . . . .wanting a perfect life for those I loved challenged my faith, my hope for the future, the purity of my love for all, rather than a love limited to those demonstrating a deservence of my love.

The unhealthy church engendered a skewed world view that limited my faith in amazing grace and attempted to define that faith by my own ability to believe or perform. Hope for the future was replace by fear of not measuring up to some hazy, uncertain standards.

Love was superficial and quickly withdrawn from those not in compliance with the group.

It became clear that I no longer had an uncompromised faith, hope, and charity and it was very doubtful I ever would regain these within this unhealthy church.

Leaving did not immediately bring me back to a healthy outlook and relationship with God. It is a journey. However, my faith is restored. God is almighty. He is in control. We need not fear. I have hope in a better future but echo apostle Paul in his statement that if in this life only I had hope then I would be of all men most miserable. This world seems hopeless but my hope rests in the Creator.

Since leaving the unhealthy atmosphere of self-righteous judgement, I can again see the love all around me. In many ways my faith and hope is restored by that. God is love! Unhealthy, legalistic churches distort that love into a system of rewards and punishments based on our inescapable human frailty. God’s love has no such constraints. Our love for others should be equally without constraint, loving our friends and our enemies and all those in between, loving ourselves and our neighbors because on this commandment to love rests all the law according to Jesus Christ. It does not rest on laws created by ill intentioned or even good intentioned men who would ignore God’s commandment to love and replace it with long lists of rules.