Author: truedefiance

When we moved overseas we didn’t have a church “building” to go to. So a handful of us met in our homes for fellowship together. We sometimes worshiped through song but if there wasn’t someone present with musical talent we played YouTube videos. It definitely didn’t feel the same as what I grew up with and at times I struggled to “enter in”. But as a whole, I was really thankful to be among a group of people living among millions of lost, who truly were listening to the words we sang and crying out in prayer and praise through this time. It didn’t always give “all the feels”, which I missed. But I soon discovered God was wanting to strip me of my dependence on my emotions, and being ruled by them.

We learned a way of studying scripture that emphasized the collective learning from the spirit of God together. And we took seriously the warning in James to not “forget what our face looked like” by just hearing the word but not obeying it. We held each other accountable to the ways that we wanted to obey. We didn’t always have grace in this area, we still had so much to deconstruct from our past for this to be loving and life giving. But it was a far cry from showing up and passively listening, shall I say attempting to stay engaged, for a whole hour to someone deliver a rehearsed and packaged talk about the bible or a concept from it. The spirit was teaching us newness from the word and we were desperate to cling to these truths more than ever in this challenging foreign land we were living in.

We didn’t have Sunday school for our kids so spouses traded times watching the kids, which meant that you couldn’t go sit through a much needed time of connection and “adult” time each week, and at times this felt like a big sacrifice for me. Eventually we found ways to incorporate the kids in what we were doing together, seeing the need to diciple them as well. But it meant that we had to be ok with distractions, and wiggling, and moments to teach them. It meant that when some parents didn’t teach their kids and left them to their own shenanigans others would get frustrated at having to parent other kids and constantly being distracted. It created a lot of opportunities to peace make together.

 Sadly, in those earlier days we didn’t have the right tools to do that in a way that God would be glorified in and actually bring more unity. Certaintly none of us learned how to peace make from our time in church back in our passport countries. What we had learned was taking offense, judging, and avoiding.

In fact I can count too many times in the past when friends, even myself at times, just moved to a different social group because we lacked the courage and most of all love in handling our conflicts in a way we felt hopeful about. A handful of those times we brought the pastors into it for help, but didn’t find any answers there. I saw this happen time and time again and even though I didn’t know the way forward I knew we were missing some big things.

Unfortunately we all brought these things with us to our “new” experience of church. We had thought we had completed our deconstruction but in reality we had just begun. And in this scenario God had us right where he wanted, we had no other social group options to turn to, this group was it, so we were forced to examen our hearts and invite the Spirit to show us the way. Or we could avoid it and begin a long slow exit through the gate of bitterness.

TO BE CONTINUED…

I remember the days where I began questioning things at church. Is this really the kingdom? We were young and in community with other leaders in the church and got to see a real inside scoop of each other’s lives. These were the “top” leaders of the church in a decade or so. Or less. But marriages were racked with emotional connecting voids, using sex as manipulation, and looking for attention outside of each other. We didn’t know how to peace make in a biblical way, we gossiped behind each other’s back, assuming the best wasn’t even on our radar. We didn’t know and accept each other. I knew that I needed hope and I wondered if hope would be found in the older generation. I looked for a mentoring relationship and found so many that weren’t willing because they felt they weren’t ready. Or just didn’t have the time. My outlook was bleak into what we would lead the next generation to.

And so my slow fade of disillusionment began with the church and those who led it. Since we were in leadership ourselves I felt like the biggest hypocrite and began asking God to release us to a healthier body of believers, where I could grow into the bigger shoes my heart was longing for. If there was one. To be honest I had my doubts.

It got to the point I couldn’t handle moving through the lobby greeting people with big happy “church smiles” plastered on their faces. How can we all be content with asking the question “how are you doing?” and answering it the same every week? What would happen if we really answered the truth?

Quite depressed actually. Instead of So thankful to be alive.

Just hanging by a thread, my ex is fighting for full custody of our daughter. instead of Blessed, so blessed.

Feeling very alone and not known even in this sea of people. Instead of Loving this community.

My revulsion at this lack of transparency, and lack of safety grew. Until I started a small experiment. When I got that cheery good morning question I would answer honestly the things that came from my depths.

 I am struggling to be here.

At the very least I would get that deer in the head lights look, like I caught them in the middle of putting on a disguise. The smile looked painful as they squeaked out an “ok, good” and kept on walking quickly into the sanctuary.

OK, good? Did they not hear what I just said?

On the best of occasions I got a “Ill pray for you” with a gentle arm touch before they hit up the coffee shop in time to get to worship in 10 minutes.

But I never got actually prayed for. Right then, right there.

My distaste grew so much that I couldn’t keep going to this masked party where everyone seemed to be drinking the punch and not caring that they were unsure of what they were celebrating. Or worse, feeling the discontent I was, but too scared to leave lest they be judged.

I asked my husband if I had his blessing to have “church” at Starbucks after I dropped our kids off at Sunday school. I no longer worked there but he was still on staff. He was wrestling with the same sense of “we thought we had the point right on the map, yup, kingdom of god”, but nothing here felt like the kingdom.  But he couldn’t quite come out with this, after all he got paid to be here. But he saw my angst growing and blessed me to take my bible to the “unchurched” filled starbucks down the street. And for the first Sunday in years I felt like I was getting closer to the kingdom. People were hurting and honest and not faking it. I knew that Jesus would be in a place like this if he were in skin today. After all he was found in all the wrong places. With tax collectors, prostitutes, the ex-demon possessed.

I did this until we had a “church-endorsed” reason to not go to church. We were moving overseas and started an internship to train others. Part of the curriculum included deconstructing church by not attending it and instead pouring through Acts and highlighting what was cultural, what was biblical, etc. I began to see the things that constituted church that weren’t necessarily commanded in scripture. Many things that happened and the way they happened were cultural. This opened up the freedom to recreate what a life-giving “kingdom focused” community meant to me. It was eye opening and I was addicted. This would begin the beginning of my leaving “the church” for the next 12 years. And every time I returned to “the building” after that I squirmed like a cat evading bath time.

TO BE CONTINUED…