I imagine that this going to be long.
When I was fourteen years old I was "saved" and started to attend a local church that I now believe to be...well, whacked, for a lack of a better term. I went there for eight years on and off (off only when I moved away for a few years) and I have never, in all of my days, encountered a group of more hateful people.
My sister and I have been publicly humiliated because we are biracial (our parents, though married when we were conceived, are apparently evil because they dared to marry one another as one is white and the other is not). I have been called a harlot because I took birth control, on the advice of my doctor, to regulate problems I have (at my age, I am still a virgin). I felt called to write to prisoners, to encourage them and to lead them to God. I was told that I am stupid for such a desire, that God does not intend for us to do such things. I was chastised in front of the entire congregation (of course my name was not mentioned, but everyone knew he was talking about me) because I had tried to minister to prisoners through letters. I have a tattoo, from a wild period in my youth, and I have been told that it is the mark of a devil. It is only a rose, and I haven't the money to remove it, and I don't think that I would even if I did...I see it as part of me now, a battle scar, not a sign that I am wed to Satan.
lol, I have a rose and a cross on my right arm...
that bunch seems to be exactly opposite of what we are supposed to be...wow.
everything they told you (that you wrote) is totally wrong.
My sister was told that the reason her first child died is because she married outside of the church (her husband is a Christian, just not a member of our former church). I was engaged to a man in my former church. He beat me. I was told that it was my fault, that if I was a good Christian woman that he wouldn't hit me. He cheated on me. Once again, this was my fault. He threatened to kill me. Everyone turned a blind eye when I reached out for help. And so I left him, because I could not stay. Suddenly I felt what it was like to be shunned. I was told to leave the church because I had refused to obey God (because I would not marry my fiancee). I was blacklisted. And although it has been nearly five years now since I last stepped foot in that church, whenever I see old church members they glare at me, or spit in my direction, or whisper loudly about how I am damned so that I can hear them say such things, or tell me that I am going to hell and that God hates me.
again, these folks are in serious trouble...not you. I am disgusted actually.
Ironically, any time that I seem to show a bit of interest in religion, I run into these folk and am reminded exactly why I left the faith.
wrong bunch...there are good Christian souls out there, believe me...but as with any section of life, there are bad apples so to speak...self righteous hypocrites...I can only imagine the sin that they themselves conceal...shameful...and if I could, I'd apologize for them...in fact on behalf of the Body of Christ, I apologize for their rudeness and holier then thou attitude...they shall have their reward.
You know, Jesus reprimanded the Pharisees about the same kind of stuff...Jesus would not approve of anything that they told you (what you have written)
I have tried going to a new church. The new church members were very nice to me. I was suspicious of them, because the only time people at my former church were ever nice to me was when they wanted something from me. I went a few times to this new church, but could not remain going there. I do not trust them when they smile at me or greet me.
some are honest..real Christians...seekers who trust the Word of God and TRY...some are totally opposite fakers...even if they don't know it.
I have tried to read the bible. I have no luck in this. Every time I look at one I am reminded of the hurt, and within a few days, even if it has been months since I have seen a member of my former church, without fail I run into one at the store and they mock me.
they shall have their reward...in like manner. I sure would not wanna be them on Judgement day.
And still, sometimes, I remember the child-like faith I once had and miss it.
ya, children are great, and I remember that time too!
I went to Mexico in 2000. Oh it was a learning experience. People there were living in cardboard boxes but their faith was unlike anything I had ever seen around here. The Christians down there welcomed us so warmly, so genuinely. There was no condemnation to be had there. No one made fun of me because I am not white enough. They insisted that we sit in their folding metal chairs, an honor for they had so few of them, and the women touched my hair and said that I was beautiful.
awesome
When I returned here, it was doubly hard because my hair, you understand, has always been the biggest problem...in the house of God it has been called "frizzy" if they were feeling kind, "nappy" if they were not. And my former pastor saying that if you are not rich God does not love you, your faith is weak, yet here were people who were so poor, who had so little to give, and I could not help but think that if there is a God, that he must surely love them the most, for they had little but were willing to give so much of that little. Some of them only had kind words to give, and yet they gave them to me, and never had I felt so connected to something bigger than me than I did there.
the pastor was totally incorrect. Jesus did not have a lot of money....and commanded us NOT to charge for the FREE info that will save ones soul. After all, God is the owner of everything...if you are His child, you own everything as well...one day those who are His shall inherit EVERYTHING. Then we can see what those hypocrites will do...if God keeps them around.
My heart is breaking anew as I write all of this down, because even though I have told myself that there is no God,
there is
and if there is that I do not want to be part of his people only to be ridiculed and mocked again, my heart still wishes for something more. But faith, I do not know how to find it. Any faith I did have has been stolen from me, or given away by me, and there is none to be found now.
what you have written shows a lot more faith and kindness then those losers who condemn you.
I have been told that it is impossible to go back once you have left the church.
wrong...if you want to get close, get close...no man can tell you otherwise.
My pastor himself said that if I left the church that there was no hope to be had for my soul. And yet, somehow, the soul still has a little speck of hope left, although it is very dim and grows dimmer by the year, until I am afraid that there shall soon be nothing left at all. The only thing that has been keeping it alive this long is those people in Mexico who changed my life so...but I cannot seem to find anyone like them up here, until I think that maybe I imagined them all and that they never existed.
