Category: unhealthy churches | Page 133

Punishment v. Discipline

Someone this weekend discussed the scripture Hebrews 12:6 “For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.”

There is a difference between discipline and punishment. God wants to discipline us, not punish us, and certainly not abuse us. Discipline teaches a lesson, while punishment demands condemnation for an action or misdeed. Discipline is positive. Punishment is negative. Abuse is an extreme form of punishment, where the punishment exceeds the crime, is unrelated to (or unassociated with) the crime, or where a person is punished without reason or unreasonably (i.e. because the abuser is angry and needs someone to “take it out on”)- abuse is misuse of punishment.

If something bad happens and we start running through our memories to see if we’ve done wrong, that’s not of God. When He disciplines us, He’ll also make sure we know exactly what we have done, and how to do better next time. There won’t be any vague “You’ve been bad. You are very bad,” condemnatory statements. That’s condemnation. Discipline, however, comes with love.

Romans 8:1 [There is] therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.

If we are condemned, we fear. God doesn’t want us to be afraid of Him! He’s our Father. He loves us. “The fear of the Lord” in the Bible refers to a healthy respect for God. It means to honor Him- not be terrified of Him.

God wants us to learn from mistakes. He disciplines, because discipline leaves hope, faith, and trust intact, and teaches a specific lesson. He disciplines in love. He isn’t waiting to strike us down for being human- for making a mistake or even for a deliberate “sin.” He loves us.

Judgmental

I recently did a search to see Susan Boyle perform her first time on Britains Got Talent. When Susan Boyle walked out onto the stage everyone from the judges to the audience was skeptical. She was frumpy, a bit silly, and said she wanted to be like a particular female singer (can’t remember the name) and everyone snickered. Then the music cued and she opened her mouth and eyes opened wide and mouths dropped to the floor. She sang I Dreamed a Dream – it was her dream to be a professional singer.

It reminds one of other stories like Beauty and the Beast or more likely The Ugly Duckling. Perhaps Susan has not transformed into the usual beautiful princess in the world’s view, but her voice is absolutely beautiful. She has done six albums and bought a 300,000 pound house (not sure how that translates to US dollars).

I said all that to say that being in an Apostolic church where everyone is judged by how we dressed and what church we attended it makes one pause. I once looked out the window at work and saw a boy with blue hair. I forget exactly what I said but a coworker/supervisor walked by and said, “Now, now.” It caught me off guard as I thought anyone else would agree with me. I was probably thinking “Blue haired people go to Hell.”

What is that saying “don’t judge a book by its cover?” I know I have seen many things since my exodus from that church that I would have been judging by its cover. But what is inside? Underneath? Did we ever see the beauty and kindness of a person because they did not look like us?

When someone would get the Holy Ghost we then began measuring the women by how long their hair was getting and their pants changed to dresses/skirts. The men only had to shave off mustaches and beards if they had them and cover up tattoos with long sleeves. We had to have them conform to our standards in order to not judge them.

Below is that first video of frumpy Susan showing everyone that you just can’t judge by what you first see.

It’s OK To Miss The Good

Memories. Previously I touched on the subject of good things happening at unhealthy/abusive churches and that being able to see and admit such is an evidence of the healing process. There is another aspect, that it is OK to miss the good that happened.

When one has been involved for awhile in any activity, when they leave they sometimes have periodic times of missing it, even longing for aspects of it again. It is natural. If you spent years coaching a football team or playing cards with a group of people, you would have periods where you missed the good times, the fellowship together, the camaraderie. I think to never feel these would be abnormal.

Why should you feel it would be different after leaving a church where you spent many months or years bonding with the people and involved in the activities? Yes, even when you later found the church was unhealthy, abusive and/or taught false doctrine. Those things do not change the good times you had or any closeness with people. It is OK to miss the good things from your former unhealthy church.

I want to share some well spoken thoughts on this, that a member of our support group once wrote. I feel it wraps up the subject very well and gives an important word of caution at the end. It is quoted with permission.

I think this is something important for anyone to realize after leaving an unhealthy church. After having been a part of something for a long time, it can be hard to reconcile mixed feelings when there were good times too. I’ve missed a great deal of things since leaving, and even felt a little nostalgic at times. Never enough to warrant going back to it, but I’ve certainly dealt with periods of sadness. I’ve cried over friendships I left behind and wished I could re-live some of the positive experiences without returning to all the negative. I think it’s good for everyone to realize some of those feelings are “normal”… so long as it’s kept in perspective and doesn’t drag us back into another unhealthy situation.

Leaving an Unhealthy Church #6: How You Are Treated

When one leaves an unhealthy church, how they are treated sometimes depends upon how those who remain perceive it.

If you are only seen as struggling in an area or being influenced by someone else, then your exit may be looked at in a more positive light. People may keep in touch, invite you to church services and functions, and the pastor may even encourage this.

If you are viewed as rebellious or no longer believing some of their teachings, you will be seen in a poor light, probably talked about more, and avoided or shunned. Some controlling pastors will tell church members to not have anything to do with you.

I remember leaving my former church for a few months before I left for good. I had been going through a rough time, had returned from being in charge of a church to a huge difference at my home church and had broken things off with my fiancé, which was very hard emotionally. During this time I was contacted by numerous members through mail and phone. this was prior to all the social media we have now.

When I left for good a couple years later, there was very little contact from anyone. Some months after I left, the pastor told everyone to turn off any recording devices during a service and he said some things about me. To this day I do not know what was said. He called other pastors from the same organization to ‘warn’ them about me. Various negative rumors circulated. I was definitely seen as bad and on my way to the hot place.

Yet when I left, I caused no problems and didn’t run around trying to pull anyone out with me. My leaving was done quietly and in a way to not bring unnecessary attention to it. But what triggered them to later turn on me, because the first several months after my exit there were no rumors or warnings?

I had been putting together a paper, mainly for my own studies, refuting their teaching of women not being permitted to cut their hair. A current member, who was a close friend, told the pastor about it after a harsh sermon he gave on hair. Only a very few had seen it and that was by their request after I had left.

How those at your former church perceive your exit may well influence how you are treated. Don’t expect many friendships to remain if you are seen as questioning or going against any teaching. The campaign against you by unhealthy leadership will intensify in an effort to keep current members in ‘the truth’ and away from you.

Living for God should not be so hard

Why is it so hard to worship God or have any kind of walk with Him?

I ran across a statement similar to this not long ago, I forget where.

The church I was in, when I was first there, seemed to be fun and I had no idea that worship could be so much fun. But then…but then. We had to be there (in church) as it was a requirement. Didn’t we love God enough? We had to shout and dance and cavort. Didn’t we love God? We had to be there at social functions like a pot luck – 100% attendance for the whole church. Saturday morning visitation in the freezing cold and wind in winter and the hot (95 at 10 am) humid mornings in summer. It was another requirement. After all, didn’t we love God?

If we were not jumping around during song service we were not worshiping. Sometimes the altar calls went to 11 pm. Most of us had jobs we had to go to Monday morning (and Tuesday through Friday too). And get up at 5 am to go to the church to pray before going to work. And then the revivals. One year we were having so many revivals I was nearly exhausted but that didn’t matter. Didn’t we love God?

Then there were the standards of dress and hair. Don’t cut your hair. Don’t even trim off one split end. Don’t even pull out the hard knot, pick it out gently (obviously said by men who had short hair). Skirts down to the ankle. A lot of the young women liked the “pencil” skirts and shuffled along. I sometimes hoped there was not an emergency where they had to RUN out of the church to save their lives. Splits in skirts had to be sewn down to the hem line. (Then one day the Pastor said we could sew them down to 4 inches below the knee which helped some). Sleeves down to the wrist. In our hot Kansas summers we could wear sleeves to just below the elbow. It was still too hot.

If you cut your hair you lose power. If you wore your skirt and sleeves too short someone was bound to be lusting after your knees and elbows. Give a Bible study or go to the “Bad Place.” Speak in tongues every single day so you know you still have the Holy Ghost. Pray an hour a day, everyday. Invite someone to church – oh the contests, we had to see who’d bring the most visitors! Read the Bible through every year.

The list just went on and on. I had lost sight of my Jesus. I did not like what I was becoming – judgmental about those who did not come to our church, the one with the Truth. No other church had the truth like we did. I remember sitting on the pew for awhile, thinking, “Where is Jesus? Where have they put Him?”

At one time, I was told salvation is so easy (pre-Pentecost days): Just believe on the Lord, He is savior and He died on the cross. The cross had all but disappeared. Like Fudge’s book: Christianity Without the Cross. Where had the simplicity of salvation gone? Why was it so complicated?

It was man’s rules that dimmed the hope of salvation and grace. Man’s rules that tried to keep people in control and in a church building. We were told God only lives here in this place. And we believed all this.

I don’t read my Bible every day now. But sometimes I pick it up and read a bit and it seems to mean more than when I rushed to read x chapters every night and felt guilty if I missed a few days reading.

Why should we feel so guilty if we didn’t follow all the rules? Why should we feel ashamed? Jesus did not preach that. Paul did not preach that. The Bible does not teach us to be/feel that way. Jesus really got onto the Pharisees about all their rules and regulations. Why do we need all that?

We don’t. Building a relationship with anyone should not be contingent on rules and regulations And so it goes with God. He loves us unconditionally. No conditions except that we worship him only and know that Jesus is the one who paid the ultimate price. That is why He said “It is Finished” and died.

I only hope and pray that those who are still following so many rules will see the light in Jesus and stop all the nonsense.