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I was born and raised in a Church of Christ ~
the kind that used a piano.
My husband T.A. and I married there, and worked
six and one half years in the junior department,
grades four through six. In those years we had kids
come to class with red eyes from crying.
We hugged them and they told us that their
parents were yelling at each other or at them on the
way to church. We
would ask the parents,
“How are things?”
They’d reply, “Great!” or “Just
fine.” There
was no hint of anything being wrong. This was
disturbing to me because when I was small, our family
did the same thing!
Another disturbing thing that happened in those
years was that some of the parents were getting
divorced and remarried ~ in the same church.
And there had been no indication that anything
was wrong. No one knew that they were having marital problems!
The pastor tried to get people to open up with
close friends so they could be helped.
But this didn’t help because a few years
later we were there because one of “our kids” was
getting married, and we found out that more divorces
and remarriages had happened in the years we were
gone!
Since we moved to northern CA we learned that
the husband of one of “our kids” had committed
suicide. He
was the son of one of the professors.
They had three young teenage children. I
suspect he had a problem that no one knew about. We’d all been taught to hide our problems so as to appear
more spiritual than we really were.
It’s very sad because he could have been
helped!
In my brochure called Why I love Small
Groups I tell how we began to grow spiritually.
Then we attended a church that was a perfect
stepping-stone to charismatic.
We weren’t ready for that yet.
It took several years.
That church taught us about hearing from God,
the power of prayer, and the importance of a clear
conscience to get prayers answered.
It was very good for us!
After some years there, we got invited to a
charismatic church.
It was a tame one, most of the members having
come from denominational churches like ours.
The pastor was wonderful, teaching us beginning
lessons from the Bible about the Holy Spirit,
holiness, hearing God’s voice, the gifts of the
Spirit, tongues, the power in praise, and lots more
that we didn’t know anything about!
We were there ten years.
In that church, I attended a women’s Bible
study group that was held on Thursday mornings every
week. We
sang praise songs to God (a new thing for me)
and then broke up into smaller classes on various
subjects. I
learned so much!
One thing I learned was that God does not like
us to pretend to be more spiritual than we are, or to
make others think it.
We should be honest when asked how we are.
Now, not everyone who asks, “How are you”
is someone you should unload on.
But you should have someone you can trust to
not gossip and tell your secrets. And it should be
someone who is more spiritual than you are.
They can help you. This group was perfect! We
were encouraged to practice using the gifts of the
Spirit, and often someone would say, “There is
somebody here who’s been thinking of getting
divorced” or some other problem. The person who it
was meant for would admit, “It’s me.” and so
then they’d be prayed for or counseled or both.
Once it was me that the word of knowledge was
about. So
I got helped. A gal started describing what was going
on in my thinking.
It was exactly right.
So I got helped! One day, the mother of one of my friends came to visit.
She got prayed for, and God revealed some
things in her life that needed help.
She never came back.
We asked the daughter why, and the answer was,
“It’s too revealing.”
She didn’t know that God was wanting to help
her!
If someone had a problem or anxiety about
anything, God would tell someone in the group about
it! A
problem couldn’t be kept secret there.
In another group that T.A. and I both attended
(an evening group) there was a case like this.
A young gal said she’d lost her joy and
wanted it back. Would
we pray for her?
So we gathered around her and started praying
softly, waiting for God to reveal what the problem
was. Soon,
T.A. got a picture in his mind of the problem.
He was new at this, so he was nervous.
He pulled one of the leaders aside and told him
what he saw. The
leader said, “That sounds like God.
Tell it.”
So this is what he said to her.
“I saw a huge funnel up above your head and
it’s filled with God’s joy. But it can’t come out because a big brick is in the way.
On the brick was a word in bold print,
ADULTERY.”
Her mouth
opened big, and so did her eyes!
“How did you know?
I haven’t told anybody!!”
Then she admitted that she’d been seeing a
high school friend and they’d been having an affair.
She also admitted that she was planning to
confess a lot of things, but not that one.
We were all amazed that she would think God
wouldn’t expose it.
So the leader helped her to confess, and she
was told she must break it off with that guy.
She promised she would, and then they prayed
for her and she got filled with God’s joy.
It was great.
I know many people, whole families, who go to
churches that don‘t have these teachings and groups.
These people have gotten so good at acting and
sounding spiritual that they have become proficient
liars. Yes,
they are faithful Christians, or maybe I should say
“church attendees,” and no one seems to suspect
that they are not as spiritual as they talk. I am amazed that they seem to really believe the lies that
they tell. I
cannot tell them what I know.
They wouldn’t believe me, anyway.
In my brochure called Can a Christian have a
demon? I
say that one way to get a demon is to continue to do a
thing that you know is sin.
I believe that these Christian liars started
out just wanting to appear more spiritual than they
were, but as time went on and they continued, they got
a lying demon. Now
they believe their own lies, and don’t even
recognize that they have a problem. If they could find
a church where the leaders and counselors can hear
from God, they could be set free. |
