I think I might be getting it

[molehills]

I was thinking everything that happened in our bad church over--again, esp the way it ended. I think I might have come to a breakthrough thought. If I had persisted in cornering the pastor and his wife and forcing them to accept forgiveness and face grace, that would have been an abusive act. I would have been violating their free will. I would have been coercing them into righteousness. By walking away, I think maybe I did the right thing, even if I couldn't understand that at the time.

Am I on the right track? What do you guys think? :confused:

[jane]

I honestly don't know, because I don't know what you are referring to. DId you want them to forgive you or them to accept your forgiveness?

If you feel like it maybe be more specific or give an example that would be like the situation if you don't want to talk about the situation.

Jane

[molehills]

I honestly don't know, because I don't know what you are referring to. DId you want them to forgive you or them to accept your forgiveness?

If you feel like it maybe be more specific or give an example that would be like the situation if you don't want to talk about the situation.

Jane

This is the part I hate talking about so I just don't which is confusing. I apologize.

We started uncovering all these terrible goings on with our pastor and his family. We were gathering the information and Biblically confronting the bit players as we became aware of various abuses that were going on. Drunken parties, misused credit cards, deacons sleeping around, all kinds of bad stuff. We were making real progress. People were setting things right and relationships were being restored, and we really thought that everything was going to turn around. I guess the pastor and his wife noticed that we were getting closer and closer to them, and that we had a better and better picture of what was really going on in the parsonage. We had a large number of reliable witnesses and evidence, and I suppose they could see we were coming there way. They began to crack down on the one child in their family who wasn't out living the wild life, accusing him of rebellion. He and his girlfriend went to them according to the Biblical pattern and then when they wouldn't hear them they took her parents and went back to talk to them again. The day after that I hadn't heard yet how the meeting had gone, and I was very hopeful. I went to a place where the pastor's wife was going to be, and I realized that not only had nothing gotten better things had become very dangerous. The pastor's wife looked at me with eyes that said nothing was off limits. She'd do whatever it took to get rid of us.

I took that seriously because on other occasions I'd had conversations with her that I had thought were just encouraging discussions, and at least one time she'd reported that I had slapped her and insulted her. I never touched her and I had merely expressed a dissenting opinion about her schedule for the nursery. I had simply felt uncomfortable agreeing when I didn't agree. She hadn't seemed upset at the time in fact she hugged me and told me how precious I was to her. I had left feeling that our time together was well spent and feeling that she was such a great friend in the Lord. She'd even made me call her to tell her I had arrived home safely since we'd parted late in the evening and I live way out in the country.

When I saw she was on the war path, and knowing that she'd have no problem lying to any extent she felt necessary. I called my husband, and he met with the pastor to tell him we were leaving the church. We just said that we were concerned that the church had too few children for our children to play with, and everyone was sent a letter saying that's why we left. I've felt terribly guilty like we gave in when we should have stood firm, but now I'm thinking maybe we did the best thing for everyone and that continuing to push would have been wrong.

Is that better?

[jane]

Molehills,

I think I got the picture, I didn't mean that you had to give me specifics; I just didn't know what you meant by

If I had persisted in cornering the pastor and his wife and forcing them to accept forgiveness and face grace, that would have been an abusive act.


I think it is good that you got out of there. The place sounds like a confusing mess. If your pastor's wife was capable of falsely accusing you of hitting her-- then you needed to leave and as quickly as possible. That could have caused some serious damage to you and your family.



Sometimes we don't need to confront everything at the church. When we left, we wanted to have a meeting with them to have the decency of "telling them that we were leaving" because of the many years and love that we had for them.


That is when THEY got abusive to us. They became really controlling- and tried to scare us into staying (Satan was decieving us and going to take us "out"). Prior to that the abuse was done by others in leadership- and before we saw any abuse; we watched others be tormented. They were never "good enough" Etc...

When the head of our intecessory prayer team left, she had no meeting. She just told them, "God told me to leave, this was my last service, goodbye."


When my husband and I spoke to her later, she said she saw others try to leave and watched the twisted entanglement. Her way of leaving prevented that kind of dysfunction.


So, I said all this to say, You did the right thing by leaving the way that you did. In my opinion.


Would it have been abusive to confront them on their sins? I really don't know. There is scripture that talks about the words of a friend are spoken timely--correction helps bring someone back. I guess it would depend on what their sins were; HOW you approached them and WHAT you said.

ok, if my closest friend is doing something really dangerous, I would sit down and lovingly tell her I am concerned. If she chooses to not agree- then I would have to leave it alone and pray. Now, if instead, I walked up to her, demanded a meeting, showed her evidence of her sins and confronted her character, called her names, demanded repentance- well, yes, in my opinion that would be abusive.

Maybe by God's grace you were spared of ever having to sort out whether or not a conversation would have been abusive-- and perhaps even spared having to apologize to them

I think somewhere on these threads we talked about how by being in a spiritual abusive/dysfunctional church we were "part of the abusive system" and are not proud of some of the beliefs that we in fact picked up and contributed towards others in that same group. There was some interesting discussion about if we learned these behaviors, were we then responsible to the level of the leaders teaching us the behaviors or still victims... look for it; it was a pretty good thread.


Jane

[molehills]

Thanks, Jane. Your input has been very helpful. I will look up that thread. :)

[Jerry]

What do I think??????,,,,,,,,,,,,,,I think that we all have the pontential to be better than we are,,,,,,,,,,and I think God knows that :D
Love Jerry

[jjc9497]

Molehills,



Would it have been abusive to confront them on their sins? I really don't know. There is scripture that talks about the words of a friend are spoken timely--correction helps bring someone back. I guess it would depend on what their sins were; HOW you approached them and WHAT you said.




Jane


True, if the person you are confronting considers themself to be a friend (as in an equal). My experience with abusive pastors is that they do not consider themselves an equal to me and therefore, will consider any negative comment by me an affront to their authority rather than the words of an equal. This has happened to me twice, and both times the men were supposedly friends. Both of these men publicly and personally attacked either me or my husband or both after we privately tried to discuss some problems with them.

[jane]

Unbelievable.

True, if the person you are confronting considers themself to be a friend (as in an equal). My experience with abusive pastors is that they do not consider themselves an equal to me and therefore, will consider any negative comment by me an affront to their authority rather than the words of an equal. This has happened to me twice, and both times the men were supposedly friends. Both of these men publicly and personally attacked either me or my husband or both after we privately tried to discuss some problems with them.\



molehills- reason number 1001 why you probably got out of there in a way that was the best and safest for you and your family.

Jane

[molehills]

I am so happy to be starting to see this as something other than a failure. I'm moving out of my house, and I didn't want to move all this sadness with me. I wanted to leave it behind, so that we could really have a fresh start. I think you guys are the answer to those prayers.

I am so glad I came here and to be a part of this group.

Thank you, everyone.

[Hesed]

I am so happy to be starting to see this as something other than a failure. I'm moving out of my house, and I didn't want to move all this sadness with me. I wanted to leave it behind, so that we could really have a fresh start.

I hope that you are able to do that. I have found that moving house can be a good time to try to break old habits (and one also has to be careful to *keep* habits that are good ones!).

Good luck.

One comment on the Original Post. I think it's very hard to "make" other people change. I doubt you'd have changed your pastor and his wife and you may very well have hurt yourself more trying to do it. I think this is the situation where one kicks off the dust on one's shoes and leaves the old things behind.

[molehills]

I hope that you are able to do that. I have found that moving house can be a good time to try to break old habits (and one also has to be careful to *keep* habits that are good ones!).

Good luck.

One comment on the Original Post. I think it's very hard to "make" other people change. I doubt you'd have changed your pastor and his wife and you may very well have hurt yourself more trying to do it. I think this is the situation where one kicks off the dust on one's shoes and leaves the old things behind.


You know, Hesed, while all the big things about this forum are great, I think it may be the little ones that are the most healing. Your expression of hope and support for my new perspective, Jerry, nicknaming me "Moe", Voyager, telling me I sounded like I was thinking for myself and lots of other little touches. They all add up to "You are an OK person."

Thank you.
Christine

[Hesed]

You know, Hesed, while all the big things about this forum are great, I think it may be the little ones that are the most healing. Your expression of hope and support for my new perspective, Jerry, nicknaming me "Moe", Voyager, telling me I sounded like I was thinking for myself and lots of other little touches. They all add up to "You are an OK person."

Thank you.
Christine

:) :) Wonderful! Thank YOU for making US feel like we are people who can make someone feel like they are an OK person.

Grace! :D