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My First Attempt

I have not wrote about my UPC (United Pentecostal Church) upbringing anywhere other than on this site, so these blogs will be my first attempt to organize these memories. Here goes.

I remember the first time I went to a UPC church. I was 4, and my Mom and I went to visit the church we would eventually join and I would spend most of my childhood in. I loved it. It was beautiful, there were lots of people, fast music, and Sunday School was fun. I can’t remember much else about those early years, except we started spending a LOT of time there.

Soon, things were changing in our house. Over the next 3 years or so, Mom started trying to get us kids to stop watching TV, even though Dad still watched it. (Dad did not go to church.) She started insisting on praying out loud before meals, even though that meant that Dad wouldn’t come to the table till she stopped. Mom started spending all her time reading books that looked like encyclopedias and laying on her face ‘praying’ in a process that looked very painful. If me or my little sister interrupted her, she’d become enraged, sometimes hitting us. The hitting wouldn’t really be considered abuse if the harshness of it was compared to a ‘normal’ spanking, but if only the reason for it were examined, the result might be different. It seems abusive to me to hit a child who needs assistance simply because the child interrupted a prayer. This doesn’t seem Christlike.

Another change in our home was that we had to start wearing dresses all the time. When I started school, this became a big issue for me. The kids at school asked a lot of times why I wasn’t able to dress normal, and not being able to wear pants meant that I was excluded from many activities. I could have done the activities in the skirts, but the school wouldn’t allow me to try. My Dad hated all this, and it caused no end of conflict between my parents because my Mom never backed down on any of these rules. Things in my home got more and more tense.

At 5 and 6 years old, there would be occasions where I would cry for hours to be allowed to wear a pair of jeans. I wanted to be normal so bad, but I couldn’t seem to articulate my feelings in any other way than “I just want to wear jeans”. My Mom had no patience with these crying spells, she would get very angry and want my Dad to punish me for being so silly. Dad would reply that he’d just give me a pair of pants so I would shut up. Mom would then say something to the affect of “I’ll just deal with her myself” and I’d be punished. Grounded from seeing friends or going to Grandma’s house – inevitably, something that I enjoyed would be taken away for a time to teach me not to “lust after the world”.

Around this time, I noticed that my Mom started getting up behind the pulpit at our church and preaching. I remember hoping that this would make her happy and things would get better at home. It didn’t happen that way.

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Standard Struggles After Leaving

Sometimes I receive an inquiry like this, “I don’t think it’s wrong for a woman to wear pants, but I can’t even bring myself to consider going out in public with them. Why??”

Please don’t push yourself in this direction. Part of having the freedom to wear what you feel is permissible, is to not wear it if you don’t want to. One doesn’t have to wear pants simply because they left a UPC (United Pentecostal Church) church. If you wish to continue wearing skirts and dresses, that is perfectly fine.

I cut my hair before anything else. That was less than a month after I’d officially left the church. I had been studying the Bible long enough before then to see their teaching of uncut hair was nowhere to be found. For some time I still pretty much wore the same clothing. I remember wearing sweat pants during a short time I was going to the gym and then eased into it from there. I wore culottes a lot before leaving the church as I was working at the church daycare and continued to use them afterward.

Here is a thought as to why you may be having more difficulty with pants.

With all the UPC standards, which is taught as being an abomination to God?

Is it hair?

Is it make-up?

Is it jewelry?

Is it sleeve or dress length?

No. It is pants on women as they use Deuteronomy 22:5 as a proof text.

This could be why you are encountering more difficulties with pants. While all the others are taught as wrong, this one links you to doing something which is an abomination to God (so they teach). There is more fear involved and you may not want them looking at you in this way.

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At times a person who leaves will develop an attitude concerning standards and feel they “don’t want to look anything like them anymore!”

I must give a word of caution as this isn’t about striving to not look like people from your former church.

One thing that is important when a person leaves an unhealthy church is that they don’t develop a reverse bad attitude. Some of us learned to judge those who didn’t dress as we’d been taught. We need to be cautious when leaving that we don’t turn and then judge anyone who still dresses that way. There is nothing wrong with someone only wearing skirts or dresses.

When changing our manner of dress or other standards, it should be because we see that the doctrine that was taught is not biblical and it should never be to ‘get back’ at anyone or to flaunt your freedom in their face. In other words, be careful to not replace one bad attitude with another.

One book on outward holiness standards that I have recommended for years is Linda Hopper’s False Holiness Standards. Linda Hopper was a former UPC member and her husband was a licensed by them. The Hoppers are now retired from ministry. The book covers topics such as pants on women, jewelry, make-up, and women’s hair. “This book is a thorough and exhaustive research project that was inspired from Linda’s desire to know the complete truth about what the Bible really says regarding Christian adornment, especially in connection with women’s dress.” You can try watching for a copy on Amazon.

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Trying to not throw the baby out with the bath water!

We have been out of the UPC (United Pentecostal Church) for several weeks (almost months) now. I have read an abundance of books, posts, other materials as well as the Bible. My son bought me a new Thompson Chain Reference Bible for my birthday in November. I am trying to figure out the best way to use it. 🙂

The more I read, the more error I see in the UPC organization/doctrine/ministry. . .

I am realizing finding the answers I need will not be an easy task.

This I know:

God loves me of this I am absolutely certain.
If I am saved as in salvation, it will only be by faith in Jesus Christ and his atonement on the cross, not by anything I have done or could possibly do.
Most of the UPC salvational works and especially ‘standards‘ cannot be supported by scripture.
There is a great deal of intentional and unintentional spiritual abuse and scamming in the UPC and other groups proclaiming to have the ‘truth’.
Giving to a church or pastor (especially a pastor) is most often not the same thing as giving to God.

Well, the past few weeks and months have not been wasted. I am on a journey. My understanding and relationship with God is growing stronger as I realize it should be built on love and trust rather than fear. I am immensely thankful for God, his Word, the wonderful people He has put in my life and the love I feel more strongly each day.

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Questions with crazy answers

When I was young, I asked my (pastor’s wife) mom:

“Why do the most sinful people in the church speak in tongues and dance the most?”
Answer: I guess God knows they need more strength so he blesses them more.

“Why do people in other churches seem so much happier and nicer than our church people?”
Answer: I guess the devil doesn’t bother them so much since he knows they are already lost.

Now that I am older than she was then, I am guessing my mom probably wondered the same things and was just trying to give me answers that would keep me in church and she probably did not know or didn’t want to know the true answers herself.

So why are people not in UPC happier and nicer?? Because they are not in bondage; they are free to enjoy the joy of the Lord without condemnation. As for the dancing, tongue talking sinners, we all can guess what that answer should have been . . . . . 🙂

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Don’t You Wear That Jewelry

I noticed a woman who appeared to be a sister in the Lord. Preparing to greet her, I stopped short upon catching sight of earrings dangling from her ears. Pierced ears identified her allegiance and revealed the influence that held sway in her life.

– Ruth Harvey in Reflecting The Glory

Many unhealthy churches teach that jewelry is wrong to wear. Some teach that its use brings about vanity and pride, calling attention to the wearer. Ruth Harvey gives it a twist. For those unaware, Ruth is a United Pentecostal Church minister, though she wasn’t licensed when she wrote this book. Perhaps she never looked into her organization’s history to see that some women, such as Ethel Goss, Nell Morgan and Olive Haney, did wear jewelry. Her teaching on the subject has branded them and many others as under the influence of the devil.

Ruth claims that “precious stones were initially created for the express purpose of reflecting God’s glory. When Lucifer was cast as profane from the mountain of God, jewels ceased to be a medium whereby God reflected His glory. After his expulsion from Heaven, satan used jewelry to effect his influence in the earth.” She shares no scripture to lend support to these claims.

Interestingly, Ruth neglects to disclose how God’s people are seen wearing or being given jewelry in the Bible. (This is a good example of why I stress the need to look into what the ‘whole’ or all of the Bible teaches on a matter.) For instance, when Abraham sent his servant to find a wife for Isaac, he gave Rebekah and her family jewelry made of gold and silver (Genesis 24). In the book of Exodus, the Israelites are given all manner of silver and gold jewelry and later at least some gave these as a free offering to God, to be used in the construction of the tabernacle and things related to it. There are other references to jewelry that show it was freely used.

Instead she shares about seeing a woman who was talking to herself, dressed in what she considered to be a “bizarre” manner. All her jewelry is mentioned. It is claimed the woman was demon possessed and the impression given is that the jewelry was tied to it. She proclaimed “her captivity was disclosed in the magnitude of jewelry that she wore.” The message is clear. One risks being possessed should they wear jewelry and the more you wear, the more “control of our lives” the devil will have.

What can we conclude? Though Ruth speaks against the use of any jewelry, she was unable to share even one passage stating God is against its use. Instead of not greeting the woman who was wearing earrings, she judged her as being influenced by the devil, and never tried talking to her to discover who she really was.

Ruth’s teaching is one of the more far-fetched I have seen in the attempts by some to persuade people to not wear jewelry. No matter how hard one searches, they will find no prohibition of jewelry in the Bible. No, not even 1 Peter 3:3 or 1 Timothy 2:9. And if it is wrong to use jewelry because it brings attention to the person, then wouldn’t wearing feathers, scarves and bows do the same (things Ruth herself has worn)?

Those who have had this prohibition ingrained in them can break free from the fear and erroneous teaching. I suggest using a concordance to look up everywhere that jewelry is mentioned in scripture. You will discover passages which show it being used and nothing stating God forbids it.

Some who discover the truth about the teaching may never wear any jewelry and that is perfectly fine. Others have had fun trying different pieces and learning their likes and dislikes.

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