I spoke with a young lady today and she was so angry at the church. I've been around long enough to know that with many people, they make this an excuse but I also know, in my experience, that some of those folks are justified. I know this young lady and I know she loves the Lord and I know her struggles with many folks over the years who are Christian. It puts me in a bad spot because, frankly, she is justified in feeling like she feels.
How do you respond to someone that has been hurt deeply? I can give the lines that the person has heard a million times in their life. "Lay it at the foot of the cross." "Forget the past and press on to what is ahead of you." I can speak to her about forgiving them and all I am doing is telling her something she already knows. Yet that anger is still there and it pops out when the conversation turns to God. She even hates feeling like this and hates the anger. She's "laid it at the foot of the cross" only to have another Christian pick it up and hit her in the face with it yet again. Christian folk with their gossip and backbiting. Christian folk with their petty jealousies and attitudes. Christian folk sniping and bitter and taking it out on anyone that they don't like for whatever reason they have for not liking them... most times the reasons are just plain silly.
How many people are we going to drive away? How many are we going to kick when they are down? How many are we going to try and knock down because they are standing up? How many are we going to send back to the wide path because they can't tolerate the people who say they are on the narrow path? I heard the young lady utter the same words, more or less, that I said way back when I was seventeen years old... "if these are the people that are going to be in heaven then I would almost as soon go to hell."
We have to change. REPENT! TURN BACK TO GOD! Redeem the time while there is still time to redeem!
I know this is always a difficult problem plaguing the Body of Christ.
ReplyDeleteIs there a solution... always. That solution is God and when a person is informed that to surrender such a problem to God is the answer, well, that is the answer.
Just that many don't know how to do this because they where never in any church long enough to be discipled in HOW to do this and WHAT surrender is all about.
Well its ALL ABOUT God and it begins with God and it ends with God. If a person places anyone, anything, any problem between themselves and God... then it's not about God at all. It's all about the problem, it's all about the people who hurt us, it's all about what that church did to me.
When people go to church FOR GOD because their relationship is ALL ABOUT God and not about a church, people in the church, a problem, a hurt, a hangup... then all this won't get in the way.
Yet it DOES get in the way!!
So surrender it... and we're right back to the HOW!!!
Through prayer is a start, add some fasting too give the praying more horsepower!!
Through forgiveness is another start... if I'm hurt, I forgive because forgiveness ISN'T for the person who hurt me. Forgiveness is for ME, so that in my sacrifice of forgiveness of others, I can be healed as God begins to take the hurt away because... I'VE FORGIVEN.
Through confession is a start, since this person confessed her hurt to you... be the fervent prayer warrior so that she may be healed.
Just a few suggestions from a person who has been hurt by the church in general and got over it because I put God first.
Pastor Ken
I was once in the same place of not knowing how to surrender and "lay it at the cross". I didn't even know what that meant or what it consisted of. When I was about to start our recovery program, I prayed "God, how am I suppose to teach these people how to surrender when I don't even know myself...you are going to have to teach me!" Well, he did and it was the hardest time of my life! I was hit from so many different directions with the things I had always struggled with that I felt beaten down. For a while I was casting things away left and right...lol...but what I was suppose to be doing was surrendering. Here is what I learned:
ReplyDelete1. Whatever a person struggled with, that is usually the area they will be hit with. If it's people putting them down, then that is what they will encounter. If it's people using them, then that is what they will go up against even more. This is what the enemy uses to wear us down. I now had to be aware of this every time I saw it happening.
2. Whenever a negative thought, anger, sadness or any emotion was hitting me from a situation or just out of the blue...I had to surrender it to the Lord..."God I surrender this anger to you, take it from me because your word says we are not to get rid of all wrath, anger and malice and are to live in peace with each other." If I did this once, I did it at least a hundred times a day for many months. What this does that we don't see is remove whatever is within us piece by piece every time we surrender it to God.
3. Learn to step out of the battle. Our battle "is not with flesh and blood (Ephesians 6:10-18)but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places." Once I realized this, I began to look past the surface of the person I was at odds with and began to pray for God to bring resolution into the situation. There have been times I may see something that upset or hurt me and I have had to learn to physically turn around and walk away. This doesn't mean we are condoning the action or words...it means I'm going to the One who can do something about it.
What did all this do for me? I am more at peace and although I still get struck by people in my old areas, I am able to forgive them because I know who is behind them touching their weaknesses to get to me. I have had to pray for God to give me a forgiving heart but it was by praying for others and surrendering my hurts and angers that I found that forgiving heart. All this may sound impossible but remember what scripture says...with man it's impossible but with God all things are possible!
Michelle