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People may wonder–*I* wonder–why it’s taken me so long to get over some things. Part of it is that I was abused in more than one church, and had been taught to doubt myself and be dependent even before that, so there’s been a lot to dig through. Part of it is that… well, think of people who were hit with a hurricane or tornado. Some sustain more damage than others.

I visualize a person who had their roof blown off looking at me, sorting through the rubble where there was once a house, now completely unrecognizable, and asking why I don’t just get a new roof. I look at them and think, ‘after this happened, I didn’t even have walls anymore. Everything was gone. YOU had a roof missing. I have a house missing. Please don’t act life my life should be just fine because yours is.’ So part of it is the amount of damage that was done.

That’s not to say that the damage is too great. People rebuild, but they will also remember. All is not lost. As many have said who’ve weathered huge storms, we survived, and we still have each other (or we still have our lives). In other words, as long as we’re still breathing, there’s hope, there’s opportunity to start over, to rebuild, to restore. Sometimes we have to start by sifting through the rubble, then slowly rebuilding from the ground up. Other times we just need to throw a roof back on, or replace a few windows.

Either way, if we’ve lived through the storm we will not be the same. Storms, beautiful, powerful, frightening, and uncontrollable, come to all of us. Some may get a couple shingles knocked off. A few branches may fall from their trees. Others… others come out of their shelters after the storm and discover that they don’t even recognize the landscape anymore. But they rebuild. They continue. They don’t move on–years later they calculate time based on the year of the storm, but they do move forward. Sometimes slowly, sometimes more quickly, all depending on how close they were to it’s center.

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Today marks the one year anniversary of the blog section of the spiritual abuse website. When it first started, I had no idea how it might go or if we’d have enough people writing for it to last. While there have only been a few posts for this month, overall we have had regular posts since our inception- a total of 464 (including this one) and 415 comments. A huge thank you goes out to all our authors and readers for making this possible.

There are so many aspects to spiritual abuse and while our experiences in unhealthy churches are similar, we also have differences. Likewise, while we all go through similar things during healing and recovery, we also experience some differences. This is one reason why various voices are needed when writing about the myriad of issues. In addition, while some may be drawn to my writing style, others will be drawn to ones who write in a different manner. We can all say the same thing, in our own way, and your words will resonate more with some and mine with others.

Some hesitate to write because they feel they are not good with words or they don’t consider themselves to be a writer. Please don’t let such thoughts hinder you from giving it a try. You could be the one who shares a thought or experience that may be just what another person needs that day. It isn’t about writing eloquently, using university level vocabulary, or being a grammar expert. It is about sharing what you have experienced, how you left and how you are healing, in order to educate and help others who have been involved in a spiritually abusive church.

I have been busy and have not written as many blog posts recently and to be truthful, I cannot do this all myself. We need many voices, from all types of unhealthy churches, in order to help the greater audience. We need articles that cover a wide spectrum of issues and could even use some brief thoughts of encouragement for the day or humorous types of posts. We don’t place any requirements on the number or frequency of blogs you would write. If you wish to do so every day or once a month, it is all good.

How did you become involved in the unhealthy church? When did you realize it was abusive? How long did it take you to leave and how did you proceed? Where are you in your recovery? What has helped or not helped you in healing? Do you experience triggers and is there anything you find that helps with them? If you were not able to read the Bible after leaving but are now able, what can you share that might be helpful to others? Did you have relationship issues while involved or after leaving? What issues have you struggled with or overcome and how did you do so? I could write for hours about all the possible issues that would be helpful to others – it is seemingly endless. You have a story to tell and words of wisdom to share if you have exited an unhealthy group.

Please consider registering to add your voice to ours by using the register link listed under the ‘meta’ section. You will be contacted by an automatic email and then by me. Be sure to choose a username (no spaces or length user names) that cannot be traced to you if you wish to blog anonymously. Blog posts should somehow pertain to spiritual abuse, your experiences, unhealthy church practices and their erroneous teachings.

This is a Christian based website. That doesn’t mean non-Christians cannot blog here. We just ask that you do not promote other religions, atheism or agnosticism.

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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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We have been taught that long, uncut hair on a woman is a symbol of submission. These teachings are taken from 1 Cor 11:1-16. I am going to demonstrate that what is said to be a matter of submission is often actually a matter of control. It seems unreal that something that is taught to be a matter of submission becomes a matter of control and it is interesting how that happens. To demonstrate this, today I am going to take some quotes from one of the most popular of the hair books in Oneness Pentecostalism, Power Before the Throne by Ruth Rieder (Harvey).

There is a lot that could be written and said here but I want to hone in on a few quotes: “We can actually open our homes for evil spirits to come in if we are in rebellion. Your uncut hair brings protection to the entire family. My sister related a story to me of a young minister’s wife in the Dominican Republic. Her husband was a very promising young man in the Bible School, an exceptional preacher. My sister and her husband consistently taught on holiness in the Bible School throughout the work there. This young woman had long hair, but she persisted in trimming it despite what was taught. She opened her home for an invasion of the enemy because she lifted the covering through her disobedience. Before long, her husband fell into adultery with a girl in their neighborhood. Their lives were shattered, and their ministry was completely ruined. The spirit of vanity had caused her to become more concerned about the appearance of her split ends than about her obedience to God.” (Pg 68-69)

So let’s look at this a little closer. The idea behind uncut hair is supposed to be submission but what it ends up being is about control. The message is this: Women can control whether evil spirits come into their homes with uncut hair. Women can keep their husbands from committing adultery with uncut hair. If evil spirits enter your home and you have cut hair, it’s your fault. You can control all these things, simply by having uncut hair.

“Can our husband’s hearts safely trust in us to guard the glory and to insure divine protection for our family so that no wicked spirit can enter in to spoil us? What an awesome responsibility, yet what a tremendous privilege that God has entrusted to the woman.” (pg 69) So, the idea is that women insure divine protection to the home by their own choice of whether or not to cut their hair and that the husbands and families are reliant upon their wives for this divine protection. This is not about submission. It’s about control.

“…This lady’s son was in a very serious car accident…this frantic mother…reminded God of how a scissors never touched her hair……the doctors came back, expecting to see a young man who was possibly dead. Instead they found he had regained consciousness and was responding…..His mother had guarded the glory and had power on her head because of the angels.” (pg 72-73)

The message here is that you can have some amount of control over health and sins of others if you simply do not cut your hair. Instead of having faith in God no matter what our circumstances are, women are taught that if they do not cut their hair, they have “power”….”power before the throne”….”power on her head because of the angels”….. Whatever the verses in 1 Cor. 11 mean, I don’t think they mean that if you don’t cut your hair (which is never mentioned in 1 Cor. 11, by the way) that you can control whether your husband has affairs or whether your children recover after accidents. Submission does not mean control and the hair message is about control demonstrated by the examples shown. This message of control can be very appealing to women, and is also convenient for men, because if their wives believe that the husband’s behavior is in the wife’s control, men don’t have to take responsibility for their own behavior. This is a very co-dependent way of thinking and fits right into dysfunctional relationships.

I have provided photos of four pages. Page 68, page 69, page 72, page 73.

(Written for the Facebook group Breaking Out.)

Getting Out the Old Books: The Literal Word by M.D. Treece
Getting Out the Old Books: Guardians of His Glory by Gary & Linda Reed
Getting Out the Old Books: David F. Gray
Getting Out the Old Books: Joy Haney
Getting Out The Old Books: Larry L. Booker
Getting Out the Old Books: Power Before the Throne
Getting Out the Newer Books: Wholly Holy: The Vital Role of Visible Devotion
Search For Truth On Holiness

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Part Two of Two Part Series

“To everything there is a season, A time for every purpose under heaven:
‭‭…..“A time to kill, And a time to heal; A time to break down, And a time to build up;”
‭‭Ecclesiastes‬ ‭3:1,3‬ ‭NKJV‬

This is my story of healing my heart and soul and rebuilding my mind and emotions….

For me recovering from spiritual abuse was very personal and private. I knew I needed healing and I needed to repair my relationship with God, which was my first priority. The problem was I didn’t know how to begin. So I started working on developing my relationship with God through conversations with God. To me this was more than just prayer like I had done in the past, this was actual conversation and telling Him about everything that I feared, my anxieties, my anger and I didn’t hold back anything. Then I would spend time in reflection, trying to hear his voice, sitting quietly outside on my deck looking at my gardens and letting his nature calm my soul and emotions, then I turned to scriptures and just began reading and meditating on his word.  I felt like I was in that place where God was telling me to “Be still and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10) .

I also read books: False Holiness Standards, Healing Spiritual Abuse, The Subtle Power of Spiritual Abuse, and a few more but I can’t remember their titles.  I surfed the internet reading all I could find on the subject and joining support groups. I was not going to a church and had not attended a service in over six months so the guilt was very high. Was it guilt from not attending service or was it the guilt and anxiety because I was enjoying not going?

My daughter and I had tried a couple other United Pentecostal churches but there was nothing there but dried up bones and that was six months ago.  I knew I was not going back to the UPC. Been there, done that. But I was still trapped in their legalism of dress and hair, simply because that’s all I knew and the only clothes I had. It had been 32 years that I had been in the UPC. I no longer needed to dress this way but I didn’t know how to take that first step to change and that seemed to be the hardest step to take.  Although my daughter wasn’t having any trouble giving up standards and she seemed genuinely happy as she searched for a church.  She kept saying, Mom, all I want us to be are normal Christians.

Normal was good I thought, problem was I didn’t know what normal was. I did receive a few emails from my former church friends, asking why I left and I should come back and repent and not backslide and blah, blah, blah. I didn’t respond and I unfriended them because I didn’t need the distraction. It wasn’t like I was friendless; I had a lot of good friends at work, just nobody I could talk to about why I left my church and religion.

One of the first things I did was purchase a new Bible, a NKJV, and began to study it with an open heart and mind. I wanted my quest in God’s word pure and fresh so I could see His grace. It was like the word came alive to me and the first scripture I read was: “I am the LORD, that is My name; And My glory I will not give to another, Nor My praise to carved images. Behold, the former things have come to pass, And new things I declare; Before they spring forth I tell you of them.” (‭‭Isaiah‬ ‭42:8-9‬ ‭NKJV‬‬) This gave me a lot of hope that I was still in His will by leaving and searching for truth.

My daughter found a friend, Anita, from Youth Camp online and she explained that we were looking for a church that was “normal” and Anita invited us to visit Crosspoint Church, which was where she went after leaving the UPC. So on Palm Sunday we went and sat in the back row by the door, just in case things got hairy. But from the first beat of the music I could feel the strong spirit of God in a good and loving way; not in a frenzied emotional way. My daughter and I cried all through the service.

When we got in the car to leave, I remember my daughter saying. “Mom did you notice how happy and friendly everybody was?” I told her yes, but it could be a fluke because nobody I knew was that happy about their salvation. Although I saw how Anita was and she was very happy.  So we decided to visit again the next Sunday on Easter and bring my granddaughters. The next Sunday was a repeat of the Sunday before and we decided to give it a try and see if this could be our church.

The Sunday following Easter, the church had a ministry fair and I signed up for a ministry called Thyme In A Garden and I registered for a summer ladies bible study to be held in a home close to me. Now I was really putting myself out there because I didn’t know anybody except the associate pastor and his wife and that was only because I grew up with them and my daughters friend Anita.

I’m very thankful for Dave and Ronda because of their wise council to me and the help and love they showed to me during this time. They also had made the same journey I was making. I remember one Wednesday night prayer meeting they both came and prayed for me. None of that grabbing my arms and spitting in my face or yelling in my ears type of praying. They simply put their hands on my shoulders and asked for God to lead and guide me down the right pathway.

After service I asked Ronda how did she overcome the dress code of the UPC?  She just smiled and told me I would know when it was time to let go of the past and she assured me when I got rid of the trappings of dress and released the vestiges of legalism, then there would be nothing between God and me except for grace. She said his word would come alive to me like never before because I could no longer hide behind a facade of self righteousness.

A few weeks later I went to my first meeting to Thyme in the Garden and I was a nervous wreck about going into a place I didn’t know. But in I walked and said Hi, I’m Cindy. I was greeted so warmly and friendly by all the ladies and they accepted me right in and I’m still going 6 years later. I met the best group of Christian women that day and they prayed for me after I told them I just left the UPC.

Being a former pastors wife, you know a thing or two about people and of course the shunning and shaming you get when you leave a church. But my biggest shock came from one friend from UPC, we’d been friends for 30 years and I had visited many times since my divorce. She was emailing me at work and I was answering her and I told her that I was going to a new church. She asked me where and I told her and I guess she looked it up online and literally became a wild woman telling me I was backslid if I could go someplace that didn’t teach standards and now I was going to be a reprobate.

Then she finished by telling me we could no longer be friends because we have nothing in common anymore. I couldn’t believe it just five minutes prior to telling her where I was going to church we were chatting away. Now we had nothing in common? I knew I was going to lose friends but I never imagined her. We haven’t spoken since that day and she, along with her family, unfriended me on Facebook. The pain of it still hurts at times but God has given me more friends than I can count now. During this time, I continued to search scripture for reassurance and God never fails:

Do not remember the former things, Nor consider the things of old. Behold, I will do a new thing, Now it shall spring forth; Shall you not know it? I will even make a road in the wilderness And rivers in the desert. (Isaiah‬ ‭43:18-19‬ ‭NKJV)‬‬

I held on to his promises because I was in uncharted waters.

I again showed up at the home where the summer woman’s Bible study was being done and again God put me in touch with Steve and Helen, former UPC Pastor and wife, who left the organization years ago. God knew exactly who to put me in touch with. I don’t know how many times I’ve called upon them to calm my fears and doubts.

“Who will rise up for me against the evildoers? Who will stand up for me against the workers of iniquity? Unless the LORD had been my help, My soul would soon have settled in silence. If I say, “My foot slips,” Your mercy, O LORD, will hold me up. In the multitude of my anxieties within me, Your comforts delight my soul.” ‭‭Psalms‬ ‭94:16-19‬ ‭NKJV‬‬

Steve and Helen prayed for me and with me, gave me scriptures to read and taught me about healing and forgiveness. I told them I wanted to start over as a brand new Christian and they even signed up to take a new Christian Bible study with me.

I started feeling more at peace every time I went to church and finally I felt the freedom to get rid of the old clothes and buy new. My daughter and I had fun shopping and there wasn’t a dress or skirt purchased. My daughter was getting ready to graduate from Beauty School, so I was her model to demonstrate a hair cut. I donated 24 inches of hair to Locks of Love and felt so light and free. I was her model for color demo and she made me a beautiful blonde. I hadn’t felt pretty since my wedding day until that day. I sat and looked in the mirror and cried.

I took the church’s Welcome to the Family class, which is a four week course that explained the history of the church, their beliefs, their staff and what was expected from a new member. Again I had to brace myself against the anxiety, but my daughter took it with me so I wasn’t totally alone. During the first class we found out the church came out of the United Pentecostal Church about 30 years ago and my pastor was also former UPC and that explained a lot of the teaching. It wasn’t legalism at all, it was grace and mercy. It was Christ and him crucified. It was no big “I”s and little “U”s. But it was salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. It was humility and servitude and living within your means. There are no thrones on the platform, the ministers sit with the congregation. They teach commitment, connection and contribution. Everybody dresses casual so all that come feels comfortable. They were answering all my questions one by one. It was amazing and wonderful all at once. I finally felt at home, that I was in a safe place and I had a place where people cared and prayed and loved each other.

My final confirmation that I was in the right place for me came in September at our ladies retreat. My pastors wife wanted all of us to go outside and enjoy nature alone with God and our Bibles. I remember sitting at a small table looking over the lake and asking God one more time, is this the place you want me to be? He replied with his word: “You whom I have taken from the ends of the earth, And called from its farthest regions, And said to you, ‘You are My servant, I have chosen you and have not cast you away: Fear not, for I am with you; Be not dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, Yes, I will help you, I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.’ “Behold, all those who were incensed against you Shall be ashamed and disgraced; They shall be as nothing, And those who strive with you shall perish. You shall seek them and not find them— Those who contended with you. Those who war against you Shall be as nothing, As a nonexistent thing. For I, the LORD your God, will hold your right hand, Saying to you, ‘Fear not, I will help you.’” (‭‭Isaiah‬ ‭41:9-13‬ ‭NKJV‬‬) With tears streaming down, I lifted up my hands and praised him for always being with me and leading me out of darkness into his marvelous light.

That was six years ago and do I still have anxiety from the past? Yes I do and I still have fear from time to time. And yes I suffered with nightmares for several months, but I put my trust in God and he never failed me.

Last year I was reconnected to a dear friend from the church we had pastored and we’d been apart 18 years, but our friendship is closer now than ever before. She has been delivered from legalism and spiritual abuse.

A few months ago I was able to call my ex-husband and forgive him for everything and he started crying and saying he was sorry for what he did. We talked for over an hour about our children and grandchildren.

My daughter met a really nice man and they were married two years ago. She has 3 girls and he has 2 girls, so now I’ve been blessed with 5 beautiful granddaughters.

Has it all been a bed of roses? No it’s not, life is still life. I lost my father and step mother within two days of each other through cancer and pneumonia in October 2011. My mother has been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease and is in stage 5-6 of the 7 stages. I was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 2011 and had to retire in 2016. And I lost a dear uncle to cancer last year (2016). But through all the trouble and tribulations, God has always been there with a comforting word and prayers, visits and ministering from my church friends helped us get through those tough times. There’s been good news, too. My aunt and cousin have accepted the Lord into their hearts and attend church with me. I helped a dear friend escape from my previous church and she is healing and attending Crosspoint, along with her grown children, who were also spiritually abused and hurt. My dear mama has also accepted the Lord.

Yes, when you’ve been in an abusive church for any length of time, things are killed in your heart and soul and things are broken down in your mind and emotions. Eventually you become spiritually crippled and emotionally damaged.

But the Lord gives us a time to heal and a time to build back up. It does take time and patience and a renewed walk with Jesus and the right church and people. And a whole lot of trust in God. It wasn’t easy and it has taken me six years to get this far, but with God all things are possible.

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation, that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has committed to us the word of reconciliation. ‭‭II Corinthians‬ ‭5:17-19‬ ‭NKJV‬‬

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