Discussion on Church Hurt

Please feel free to join this discussion.  I am very interested in the thoughts of others on the subject.

I have read a number of blog posts on the subject of "Church Hurt" in the past week.  It kind of freaked me out that they all seemed to come out of the woodwork at once.  Then I realized that "freaked out" feeling was the Holy Spirit tugging at my heart.  

I have been thinking about "Church Hurt" all week, and it finally hit me this morning, while sorting out my feelings on a minor incident that resulted in hurt on multiple levels:  the church itself - the administration, the leaders, those in authority - allow the church to become a breeding ground for hurt when they create an atmosphere in which its members are discouraged from thinking for themselves.

Am I saying this is the only possible situation that can result in "Church Hurt"?  Not at all.  There are as many potential scenarios for hurt as there are people in a church.  But this is the one I have seen the most closely, and so what I am going to discuss today.

Pride may be one of the ugliest things I have ever seen.  When combined with the attitude of "I know it's true because my ___________ (pastor/deacon/ss teacher/highly respected Christian friend) said so," it sets a dangerous precedent in creating an environment not suitable for anyone with a strong desire to grow in Christ and His Word.

For those who don't know (or even those who do know, as I can almost guarantee that you "know" through what you have "heard," not through a personal discussion with me), I endured my own "Church Hurt" several years ago.  This occurred at a time when I was being particularly harshly lambasted by Satan as I grew closer and closer to God in my personal walk with Him.  Satan was doing everything he could to keep me from my Father, and as he has no boundaries and certainly no conscience, he even used members of the church to contribute.  Ultimately, I left the church of my own free will, probably much later than I should have, although in defense of that, I naively believed people would "come to their senses." 

My own experience with "Church Hurt" was a direct result of equal parts pride (I would never do anything like that!), refusal to study the Bible and think for oneself (the pastor says it, so it must be true!), a love of and to gossip, and outright lies (pride again? a need to be accepted by the larger part? I'm honestly not sure.).  ALL of these things, in this particular situation, resulted from a church environment where members were expected to take all teachings as absolute truth, were not encouraged to study and learn and enrich their hearts through their own studies in God's Word and conversations with other godly teachers and individuals outside the church leadership, and were strongly discouraged from any type of humble questioning and discussion, even when done with the right attitude - rather, if questioning occurred, the individual doing the questioning automatically had a bad attitude or was straying in his/her walk with God.

And by the way, yes, everyone was encouraged and expected to have individual time and studies in God's Word, but if this study resulted in anything not an exact duplicate of what the church was teaching, then the reader did not have the right attitude or was not listening to the Holy Spirit.

Where to even begin with that... it could be a blog post all on its own.  To determine that a person was not listening to the Holy Spirit simply because his/her Biblical studies do not match your own or question your own...  I shudder at the thought.  May God's mercy and grace help me each day to NEVER be that kind of wife or mother or teacher or friend.

The truth is, we are all sinners, equal in God's eyes, none of us worse or better than any other.  He loves us all the same, and all of our sins are as filthy rags.  There is no mention anywhere of rags any filthier than others. 

So why do Christians continue to judge others based on the severity of their (at times perceived) sins??  I just don't get it.  To behave that way does not proclaim to the world that you are saved by grace.  To behave that way shouts that you believe you have done something to make you more worthy, and that the person you are criticizing is somehow less worthy of God's mercy and forgiveness and love than you.

I learned A LOT from my "Church Hurt" experience.  Mostly I learned to be much, much more cautious with who I trust, which I will admit has been detrimental in some ways.  Because by "cautiously," I basically mean that I trust no one outside of about three people.  I also learned something very important about standing up for myself and my own beliefs, even when doing so makes me an outcast in the one place that is not supposed to have outcasts.  More than anything else, I learned firsthand the truth in God's promise to never leave nor forsake me.

I would like to end by asking - beseeching, even - any of you who have ever heard anything of anyone through someone not the subject of the conversation, that you 1) end the gossip right there by confronting the relayer of information and refusing to pass on the information, and 2) approach the person who is the subject of the gossip, if you have questions about the information.  Not doing so only hurts every single person involved, and often more than anyone else in the chain, the subject of the gossip.

Little Visits - Following the Leader

Yesterday was a bit of a... chaotic day.  Hunter and I started NaNoWriMo, which was exciting enough in itself.  Then we also took my car into Best Buy to get the MP3 jack put in (which took an hour and a half), and ran to Walmart for a few necessities to get us by until our next big monthly trip.  By the time we got home, it was dinner time; and then I had the first hour I had had to myself all day, so I took advantage of it and got some scrapping done :).  On top of all that, one of Randy's employees passed away yesterday morning, and my entire day was spent in prayer.  All of that to say, I didn't get here to talk about our devotions from the morning :).

The devotional story was about kids playing follow the leader, who went through some places that made it difficult for the children to follow at times.  Then we talked about how it's our responsibility to follow God where He leads us, even when it is difficult to follow.  It was so relevant and really spoke to me.  It also got me thinking about this past year and all the places God led us that really were difficult to follow Him through.  

For those of you who didn't read my adoption blog last year, the path with the kids started off rocky, with a fight from their great grandparents almost right out of the gates.  When the workers prepared to move the kids into our house for post-adoption foster care, a distant relative, who had professed to have no interest in adopting the children in the past, interjected themselves into the picture.  To avoid long drawn-out court proceedings trying to fight it, the DA opted to pursue that family, and we were told over the phone that we had "lost" the kids.  After two days of crying, wrestling, and bringing ourselves back to the realization that God was in control, we received another phone call telling us that the family, when told they would be pursued as an adoptive family, had backed out.  We took another two days to pray for God's will, and knew without a doubt where He was leading.

The next seven months were punctuated with court hearing after court hearing as the great grandparents continued to fight. 

Then there was a time almost exactly a year ago, when we felt so discouraged by the way things were going in court with the kids' situation.  We left one court hearing where things went in the complete opposite direction of what everyone - even the lawyers - was expecting, and we seriously considered calling our case worker and telling her we were done.  But after praying about it and realizing all that God had already brought us through, we knew He was still leading us forward.  We wouldn't be the ones to walk away; we would wait for God to shut the door.

Obviously, God knew where we would eventually end up, if we only followed Him.  We adopted our children in February of this year, and not a day goes by that I don't thank God for giving us the faith and strength to follow Him over the difficult paths.

Today's (yesterday's) verse: Ephesians 5:1 "Be followers of God, as His dear children." 

Little Visits

So the kids and I have started something new.  I really should have started doing this a long time ago, but to be honest, it never crossed my mind.  I'm a bad Mommy.

We are doing devotions together over breakfast each morning.  One thing about it that's really special is that we are using a children's devotional book that my aunt had when she was little, and I had when I was little.  It's called "Little Visits with God."  It's beat up and the binding is taped together and the intro and first story are missing, but I think that makes it even more special.  I don't know for sure if I'll be able to write about it every day, but I'm going to try.

Today we talked about how everything we own belongs to God, not to us.  We talked about some of the things that we think of as "ours," but are really God's, because He gave them to us and lets us use them.  It's a concept I've always known of course, but don't think about every single day.  Since having so many blessings come into my life over the past few years - my husband and children to name a few - I've tried hard not to take anything for granted.  But I still fail at that every single day.  

For example, I sometimes think of things as "mine" and I don't want to share them.  And that is the complete opposite attitude of the one that I should have.  We are expected to use what we have to help others, to show them Christ.  The last thing we are supposed to do with what God has given us is keep it to ourselves.  What good are our treasures here on earth except if we can use them for the good of people and souls?

Also, we are planning to move in the spring.  In all honesty, we are sorely in need of a bigger house.  The house we are in now was perfect for a married couple and a half-time kid, but is nowhere near enough room for a family of five, let alone a family of five-hoping-to-be-six.  God has really been gracious and merciful in laying out the path for our family, in guiding us in the directions He has for us, and in closing doors on the directions He does not have for us.  But lately, I have been thinking a lot lately that I just can't wait to find our new home and move into it.  Now, I know it's not wrong to be excited and eager for some positive changes for our family, and I'm certainly not trying to "rush" God.  I'm simply ready to get out of our tiny space and into something better suited for our growing family and extended family.  But, our devotions this morning were a reminder to me not to take what I do have for granted.  Even our tiny house with its tiny bedrooms and tiny kitchen and tiny yard was given to us by God, and we are by all means grateful to have it.

My hope after today's devotion is to be a better example for my kids, so that they can understand these concepts as we study and learn them, and so that they can see what it means to truly live in Christ.

Today's verse: Psalm 24:1 "The earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof."