Joyless, Powerless, Loveless Watered-Down Church?

Vote with your feet and:

By Patricia Backora

Ever wonder why so many who genuinely love Jesus are fed up with
the typical church experience?

Because church aint what God intended it to be. Consider this

passage:

Acts 8:5 Then Philip went down to the city of Samaria, and preached
Christ unto them.
6 And the people with one accord gave heed unto those things which
Philip spake, hearing and seeing the miracles which he did.
7 For unclean spirits, crying with loud voice, came out of many that
were possessed with them: and many taken with palsies, and that
were lame, were healed.
8 And there was great JOY in that city (emphasis mine).

Philip preached Christ to the people. The people heeded his preaching.
Not just the one or two souls modern preachers are lucky to convert,
but the whole city listened! They got healed and delivered from evil
spirits. You still have preachers preaching about Jesus today, but
whats missing? The miracles of healing and deliverance! The JOY
which results when people are set free from the power of darkness!
You repeatedly read of the BEGINNING of the early church being a

experience, although they werent perfect either (see Acts

2:46; Acts 13:52; 15:3; Rom.14:17). The city of Samaria was filled
with JOY because its people were being healed of disease and set free
from demonic oppression. The Kingdom of God was in POWER, not in
word (I Cor.4:20). Todays typical service is cold, dead words. Or an
endless whipping from the pulpit by control freak spiritual dads who
profit from the insecurities and fears of unenlightened sheeple they
con into feeling unworthy to receive Christs free Gift of Salvation.

Today when people in the street spot gangs of church people

stampeding toward them with church brochures and tracts they say,
Oh, no! Make a run for it!
Instead of bringing the power of God to the people, Christians whove
been taught that miracles have been done away bring only windy,
watered-down words which dont offend anybody, but are powerless to
convict of sin (Isa.26:18). Some radical fringe groups try to SCARE
people into loving Jesus, but on the other end of the spectrum youve
got showmanship preachers who preach pretty words that dont offend
anybody so they wont scare the fish away. But no deliverance is
brought to people bound by the devil. The TRUE gospel of Christ
DOES bring offense (Gal.5:11) to the devils crowd who are proud of
their sin and want to hang onto it at any cost, even at the cost of the
eternal damnation of their own souls. The Greek word used here for
offense is skandalon, which means a type of trap. Sounds a lot like
the English word scandal, doesnt it?

Sinners who dont want to listen to Gods message will be tripped up

(offended) by the message of the cross because Christ shedding His
blood on the Cross for them clashes with their own idea of how God
ought to forgive people. They can be offended even by the suggestion
that they are sinners in need of Gods grace. While some believers go
to one extreme and walk on eggs to make their message as nice as
possible, other Christians misunderstand that word offense to mean
they can aggressively confront some total stranger on the street and
scream at them for being rotten sinners. Sometimes words in the King
James version carry a different connotation from the meaning we give
them today. Offense in that context means a stumbling block which
blocks someone from understanding spiritual truths.

I Thes.1:5: For our gospel came not unto you in word only, but also in
power, and in the Holy Ghost, and in much assurance; as ye know
what manner of men we were among you for your sake.

Most evangelical churches claim to be preaching Pauls gospel. While

many deny the power of God is for today, they strongly imply that the
ONLY miracle God still does is to save souls from hell after they die.
Why do they think this way? Because of a far-fetched distortion of I
Cor.13:10, which teaches that when that which is perfect (complete)
has come, then incomplete divine revelation through the gifts will
cease (no longer be needed). Like a cloudy camera lens, spiritual gifts
convey a partial picture of the workings of God through imperfect
human vessels. But that verse does NOT say that spiritual gifts will
cease once Bible translators have compiled the 66 books of the Bible
in one volume and pronounced it complete, which, BTW, was done by
Catholic theologians in 325 A.D., long after the death of the apostles.

Modern churches are packed with printed Bibles, but the Word without
the power of God is like matches without a spark. Despite millions of
windy preachers and billions of Bibles, the earth is filled with darkness,
and the church copies the ways of the world to fill the void left by the
absence of Gods power. Satan twists scripture to inundate the church
with ridiculous, dangerous doctrines and secular humanism. Christians
cant get themselves healed of deadly diseases, not even simple sinus
problems. Some Christians are on medication for their nerves because
the devil is making mincemeat out of them and they cant cope.
Satans deadly arsenal of fiery missiles keeps the Christian gnawing his
nails wondering where his next attack is coming from. Only a fool
would think we dont need all the spiritual weapons we can get to
counteract satans sophisticated nukes. The latest trend these days is
to teach that we dont need to fight the devil anymore. Try telling that
to someone who is deathly sick, or is experiencing one run of bad
luck after another.

The word perfect can mean fully grown as well as complete.

Col.2:10 says the saints are ALREADY complete in Christ, and yet the
spiritual gifts were in full operation 2000 years ago when this was
written. The eternal God, who can see further down the railroad track
than we can, views Christians as being ALREADY complete in Christ,
though there were many problems and rifts among certain Christian
congregations, even when this scripture was penned in Pauls day. I
believe this passage speaks of Gods work in the church to bring it to
maturity and perfection. Is the church already experientially mature
enough, and perfect enough to no longer need miraculous
manifestations of Gods power? Think about it. With all the loony
doctrines and outright swindling going on in modern churches, Id say
the church is a LONG way from perfect!

Its erroneous to think God doesnt need to do miracles today because

the canon of scripture has been completed. Goody! We get to read
about Bible characters getting healed while we have to die of some
dread disease because miracles are done away. To be blunt, the
Bible is irrelevant for today if we cant experience the same
deliverance Bible characters did. How on earth can you get a sick drug
addict enthusiastic about a once-upon-a-time healing power thats
not for today? What if the guy cant even read? Because we have a
complete Bible on our shelf we allegedly dont need Gods power
anymore, except to save us from having to roast in hell! But Paul
himself says that his gospel is in POWER, not in words only. What good
does it do to tell a dying cancer patient, Cheer up, brother, you dont
need deliverance FROM the sickness. All you need is the Bible, and
God will miraculously change your attitude IN the sickness.

Funny, but I dont read of Jesus smiling piously and patting some leper
on the head, telling the poor chap that God will preserve him IN the
sickness even if he doesnt get delivered FROM IT in this life. Having
to adapt to satans attacks instead of zapping them, thats not part of
the Good News Jesus came to preach. If miracles are missing today,
something else must fill the vacuum, or the fish wont bite and come
to church. Most people who file into church arent in a very joyful
mood after fighting the traffic, worrying about the bills, squabbling
with each other on the way, working two jobs, etc. Theyve come out
of a sense of HAVING to go to church. They hope God isnt mad at
them for faking enthusiasm while wishing they were still in bed.

So what fills the vacuum? Words, words, words. The preacher

promises a better life in the Great Beyond as compensation for all the
hell satan puts them through in this life. He doesnt seriously believe
you can win the victory over the devil in the here and now, though he
pays lip service to Jesus is Lord. The preacher spices up his
powerless message with tall tales, hoping to keep his parishioners
from taking a nap. But they nod off anyway because his tired old jokes
arent even funny! Because of the absence of joy on those deadpan
faces out in the pews, professional musicians play with all their might
to try to drum some up.

First you have the praise service, dubbed the Outer Court ministry,
where you enter into Gods gates with praise. This usually consists of
bouncy, repetitive choruses a tiny toddler could compose blindfolded.
They make you sound like a crow if the keys too low for you, and
make your voice crack if youre a bass singing a soprano key. Ive
heard some songs which consist of four or five disjointed words
repeated over and over again. Unless theyre supposed to be an
emotive lament out of the frontal lobe they just dont compute. I
honestly didnt know what message the composer of such a piece is
trying to get across. The aim of such mind-bending caterwauling is to
set you to jumping like a jackrabbit as you wildly wave your arms at
the bright lights above (remember your deodorant!). After swiveling
and swaying twenty minutes or so and singing the same four ooey-
gooey sounds over and over again, youve whipped yourself up into a
semi-hypnotic frenzy, and you can say the Lords finally been praised.
Now youre all psyched up to get serious with God by singing him
some worship. The tunes change from a sunny major key to a
weepy minor key. The mood changes from celebration to lamentation.
No happy-clapping, piano-pumping, foot-stomping fun fest now. Now
it gets very introspective. Something like: Sweet heart of love, melt
me, break me, ad nauseam. Such a long, drawn-out guilt trip over
yesterdays spilt milk which has nothing to do with our justification in
Christ. You can beat yourself to death with a silk necktie if you do it
long enough, it doesnt have to sound rough. And how many Christians
have, in those weepy worship moments, vowed to go overseas as a
missionary to some pestilential jungle, even if it killed them, while
refusing to reach out to some stranger sitting all alone in their pew?

Even if it KILLED them. Some Christians take 2 Tim.3:16 and run

away with it. ALL scripture is profitable for doctrine. So theyll put two
and two together and get nine. Based on 2 Chron. 16:12, some think
its a sin to go to a doctor. In this context Hezekiah didnt seek Gods
help for a foot problem, just consulted his personal physicians. But
Christians interpret that to mean God hates the medical profession. To
further complicate matters, Biblical scholars are increasingly convinced
that Mark 16:14-20 is a much later addition to the original text of
Mark, to give it a more satisfying ending. So many Christians have
died denying the existence of deadly symptoms as they confessed to
healing that hadnt yet manifested. A few have died handling snakes
on the basis of Mark 16: 18. There have been sad newspaper stories
about children dying from treatable illnesses because their parents
relied exclusively on the power of prayer. A wise missionary will boil
his water, not test God with Mark 16:18. Far from disapproving of
doctors, God saw to it that the very rare specialist Tom needed to save
his leg happened to be in California just in time.

After a lifetime of reading and hearing all sorts of excuses for why
people profess healing but keep their symptoms after being prayed
for, and having never seen greater works than what Jesus performed
while on earth (see John 14:12), I must conclude that something
doesnt add up. Could it be that Gods power is missing from the
church because of a few nefarious practices it clings to (i.e. tithing,
refusing to confront sin in the church in the name of love,
dependence on fasting or other sacrifice to butter God up, etc.)? In
the final analysis, God is sovereign. No amount of positive confession,
fasting, Bible quoting, singing, or dancing will make him put on a
public display of spectacular miracles. Rather, God usually performs
QUIET miracles in the lives of His people, such as: saving them from
some disaster in the nick of time, warning them of danger, putting food
on the table, providing practical solutions to problems.

As a young girl I went to some good conferences. It was the most

wonderful vacation I could think of, traveling with church friends to this
church camp ground to spend time with saints from far and wide, and
soak up some good teaching for three meetings a day. Admittedly, I
was a little more patient in some areas back then than I am today. I
was a real trooper with strong sitting bones. Those meetings could
last 2-3 hours each and it was a relief to get up and hop around while
the music played. Everywhere was heard the whirring of cassette
recorders in those rows of pews. When youre freshly filled with the
Spirit and still relatively unfamiliar with the Bible, everythings brand
new and you think every word that proceeds from the pulpit is a
precious pearl from heaven. Ive still got a bunch of old cassette
tapes from those meetings, and one evening I replayed one just for old
times sake.

This particular preacher was highly esteemed as an edifier of the Body

of Christ. But as I listened to the old tape he rambled on and on and
on for ages in his laid-back hypnotic drawl, until I turned him off so I
could stay awake. He spoke thousands upon thousands of words but
said very little of substance, just chuckled and made lots of pointless
anecdotes. He could have made his point (if he had one at all) in only
five minutes. I think special speakers are allotted so much time at
such meetings, and they think this is their moment to shine. So they
better stretch it out as long as possible so their immortal wisdom can
be recorded for posterity.

I dont believe in being a slave to prepared texts and notes, but for
Petes sake, have some sort of a coherent message in mind before you
step up to the pulpit! Some preachers probably confuse letting the
Lord lead with sloppy preparation (Prov.24:27). If theres nothing
much to say of any substance, far better to spend that time letting
people testify, or waiting on God to move through the spiritual gifts, or
praying for peoples needs. That way the time is profitably used for
the Kingdom of God. But oh, well, when youre young, youve got all
the time in the world to wait for the preacher to make his point

One night those people in the pews saw something real exciting. I
honestly dont know how our level-headed apostle ever gave this one
preacher permission to minister at a campground well-known for sane,
sound doctrine and serene services. But this particular guest speaker
was deep into demonology. According to him, demons caused
everything under the sun. You could have a demon of toe-twitching,
hair-pulling, or nail chewing. He held out his own nails and said, See
how nice my nails look?

Where demonology is concerned, he may have done his homework,

but not much housework. You dont need satan to nuke your nails if a
can of Ajax will do the job. Everybody can have pretty nails if all they
do is preach. That man, who looked like Mandrake the Magician, saw
demons behind every bush, in every corner of every room. He grinned
like Bela Lugosi as he warned of the unrelenting, ever-present danger
of forces of evil lurking in every coffee cup. I wasnt so worried about
demons as the weird vibes that preacher was giving off. He was one
spooky dude! No wonder every devil in the county was too scared to
mess with him! But my, he had one hellacious night. Young people
had the devil cast out of them left and right. Several hollered and
screamed and jumped around. Others were barfing up their supper by
the time he got done with them. To think wed driven 600 miles to see
that! That was the most unforgettable service of the whole convention,
for the wrong reasons of course.

One day I passed our local supermarket. There were tables set up
outside with free cups of coffee and Hershey Bars to tempt passers-by.
Hersheys is my favorite sin and its hard to get them here so I
stopped to talk to the Christian young people who were inviting
people to their church. I didnt want to nibble and run so I chatted with
them and smiled sweetly. I knew quite a bit about their church. Loud,
repetitive music, lots of prosperity preaching, no body ministry to
speak of, just the pastor controlling everything so the program runs
smoothly. Like many churches, its nominally Charismatic, but strikes
me as your typical canned religious routine, without much mention of
the Spiritual Gifts, sort of watered down so as not to scare visitors
away, ho hum. Someone had flown those Hershey Bars over from the
States. They wrapped the bars in white paper printed with red hearts.
I think it was around Valentines Day. They were holding a special
weeklong pageant at their church to show our city how much they
loved it. I enjoyed the chat but kept some of my thoughts to myself.
Can you imagine Peter, Christs Fisher of Men, using Hersheys
Chocolate as bait to catch souls and spread the Gospel of Christ? Now
Ive seen everything!

One very old denominational church posts clever clichs on its

signboard out in front. When I walk by I shake my head to think its
sad that this is what the Church of Jesus Christ has been reduced to.

The best-known Charismatic church in town has a pastor who looks

like he swallowed petrified vinegar, he looks so glum. The only
contribution most of the people make to the service is at offering time
or when they sing the sleepy song service. The preacher just rambles
on and on at a lot of comatose faces. You dont feel spiritually fed
when you leave.

When those folks have their midweek prayer meeting, they moan and
groan to God about how sinful they are, how they long for His power
to come down. Maybe they wouldnt know what to do with it if they
had it. One poor fellow tearfully begged God to break him to pieces to
make him more spiritual (whatever that meant). I got no positive
impression of that place, except the free coffee.

Someone told me these people once held a 21-day fast. Youd think
God would rather see them spreading His JOY throughout the
community than drumming up fake sorrow through a long fast. Where
I live, theres sort of a cultural taboo against looking joyful. Its not
very macho to show such feelings. Even the traditional music of this
nation sounds like a lament. I Thes. Chapter 5 contains a list of things
believers are required to do and fasting is missing from it. Believers
are exhorted to rejoice evermore (verse 16). Some saints misread that
and rejoice NEVERMORE!
If youre a visitor at that church, dont count on being spoken to before
or after the service, even if youre neat, presentable, odor-free and
friendly. Unbelievers are far friendlier. No wonder Jesus gave up on
religious folk and hung out with sinners. People just gather in their
tight little cliques and chitchat about nothing in particular. When you
have a whole pew to yourself and you have to initiate every
conversation at fellowship time it makes you wonder if you wandered
into an exclusive monastery where visitors arent welcome. Maybe
they think youre on something if you actually smile instead of moan.
But seriously, in recent years Ive NEVER seen any of them out in the
streets inviting people to church or doing much of anything to get the
word out about Jesus and His love. Its just church as usual and
such Christians wonder if the next Big Church Fast will finally recharge
their dead spiritual batteries. Maybe, if they dont fantasize about
Hershey Bars, huh?

Why do so many churches stage a 21-day fast anyway? Apparently

Daniel did this so Christians have to as well. It doesnt matter that the
apostles never taught fasting or even recommended it as a sure-fire
way to whip old satan. Daniel lived under the Law and was observing
Jewish customs, including facing Jerusalem whenever he prayed (Dan.
6:10). Besides fasting, Daniel threw ashes on himself and wore sack
cloth to torment his body (9:3). Can you imagine some guy showing
up at the Big Church Fast wearing a burlap bag, with cigarette ashes
all over his head?

Say theres this preacher standing by the door and he takes one look
at the guy and says, Are you nuts? Whatre you doin, comin to
church lookin that way?

Well, Preacher, you did say this was a Daniel Fast, didnt you? Daniel
threw ashes on his head and wore burlap as part of his religion.

Yeah, but we do things different here. Weve come a long way, baby.
All a modern Daniel fast means is you starve yourself 21 days.

Where does it say Daniel starved himself, Pastor? It only says he ate
no good-tasting food during that period, and he did without meat and
wine. We dont drink anything here but coffee anyway, and so far, that
just eliminates hot dogs from our diet. Well be on this Daniel Fast for
three whole weeks and well need some sort of protein, so can we have
beans?

No toots, just juice. Some of our people stick strictly to liquids.

Seriously, Pastor, can I have tofu, granola or what?

I dunno. The pastor grits his clean teeth, wondering what to say.

Maybe this scripture will give us a clue, Pastor. Here, in Colossians

2:20-21, Paul writes an admonition against coming back under old
rules. When you say touch not, taste not, handle not, thats not New
Covenant liberty, thats Old Testament legalism.

The pastor smiles through his stomach pain. Oh, but I didnt say you
couldnt touch a T-Bone, just eat one.

Pastor, youve just put the whole congregation, including expectant

mothers and hard workers, under spiritual pressure to abstain from
food for three whole weeks. Get a load of 1 Tim.4:1-3.

See? Commanding Christians to abstain from food is a doctrine of

devils. It doesnt say, except for when you stage a church fast.

The preacher pulls the ace out of his sleeve. Well, I Cor.7:5
commands married people to abstain from ah intimacy, so they
can concentrate on fasting. Gotcha there, buddy.
Paul doesnt COMMAND them to do either, Pastor, he just says that if
the couple themselves decide to temporarily give that up and just pray,
they ought to get back together if they feel like they cant control their
hormones anymore. And thats the ONLY mention of religious fasting in
all the epistles. All other times fasting is mentioned in Pauls letters,
hes suffering persecution or just lacks the cash to buy food with.
Paul was on a forced fast, not a religious fast. To put it bluntly, Paul
was starving! Besides, the most reliable Greek manuscripts dont even
include the word fasting in I Cor.7:5.

Thats a bald-faced lie! the preacher shouted. Youre pushing other

Bible versions and thats a sin! Everybody knows the apostles spoke
King James English. Why else would they have wrote the Bible in it?
Hey wait, why should you look more spiritual than we do? We aint got
no burlap bags here but I can scare up a few drop cloths out of that
Sunday School room theyre paintin. Ill throw open all the east-facing
windows in the Sanctuary so we can stick our heads out and face
Jerusalem while we sprinkle baby powder on our heads. If you dont
want to do your bit to make God happy you can take your carnal
carcass over to McDonalds!

******

In the absence of real miracles to draw sinners to Christ, churches put

on free concerts and plays. Many years ago I watched this one church
puppet show, Mr. Penny Pinchers Christmas, which a five-year-old
would have loved. A mean Scrooge puppet Mr. Penny Pincher
threatens to throw this poor widow woman puppet out of her home for
being too poor to pay the rent. Shes a believing puppet who says she
isnt worried because the Lord will take good care of her. That
cantankerous old puppet finally sees the light and gets saved and
theres a happy ending. We were all smiling when we went home.

The preacher who ran this church loved happy choruses. It made him
do a little jig when the piano pumped out the bouncy music. But he
wasnt always a happy camper. He must not have learned much from
watching Mr. Penny Pincher. He claimed that God used some woman
evangelist to heal his crippled leg, so thats how he got inspired to
start his ministry. Before that hed been bedridden. He was gloriously
healed and started preaching for the Lord.

One night I wised up about him. Most of the folks there were
struggling to put food on the table. They could barely afford the gas
to get to church to watch any puppet shows. They were lucky to be
able to put a quarter in the offering plate. If anything, they should
have received something from somewhere to help THEM out! That
preacher didnt show much Christmas spirit when he pulled this little
stunt at the start of one service: He took a ten-dollar bill out of his
wallet (a small fortune to the rest of us) and said, Now Ill be the first
to start the offering. If youre slipping a nickel in the offering plate,
dont sneak it in the plate so no one notices. Put your offering in like
this so everybody can see and hear it! He put the ten-spot in the
offering plate, which was on the pulpit. Then he pulled a fistful of
nickels out of his pants pocket and flung them in front of the pulpit,
where they clattered, flying all over the place. If youre gonna give a
nickel offering, dont act like youre ashamed of it!

Those poor souls should have gotten up and left. I think the preacher
was just ticked off because he liked to go traveling with his family and
the meager offerings were cramping his lifestyle. Refusing to show
grace toward financially strapped saints wasnt a good way to show
God gratitude for His healing.

Contrast the greedy, grabby materialism of many modern church

leaders with the attitude of the early church where the welfare of ALL
the members was tenderly cared for, so that none of them lacked the
necessities of life (Acts 4:34-35). The opposites happening today.
The poor are depriving themselves of bare necessities so the rich in
the church can live high on the hog.
Dont prosperity preachers realize theres only one pie in this world,
and for the one per cent to hog the lions share of the wealth, the 99
per cent have to survive on the few crumbs that are left?

Prosperity Preachers never preach on the main theme of Solomons

book Ecclesiastes, that the pursuit of worldly wealth and pleasure is
vain. Nor do they mention the unfair distribution of wealth in Song of
Solomon 8:12, where Solomon got five times as much for the fruit of
the vineyard as the peons who sweated under the hot sun to cultivate
that fruit. Thats how the rich get richer. I dont know many who got
filthy rich by working with their hands (Ever notice how smooth a rich
mans hands look?) Preachers give Song of Solomon a lofty spiritual
interpretation. But I cant help but marvel about how Solomon
enjoyed endless hours of flower-scented romance while his sweating
slaves toiled away on his building projects.
Know what the main problem with the typical church scene is? Having
to create it and give it some name to identify it as a recognizable
church, as it is understood to be today. That particular it could start
off very small but end up being a big white elephant demanding land,
a building, a staff, etc. In order to worship together, Christians
instinctively build an organization people GO TO, while Christ created
an organism (a LIVING thing), His Body the Church on earth. Wouldnt
it be great, if instead of GOING TO some building as a religious
routine, Christians WERE the church and just wanted to BE together
for unstructured fellowship. An informal coffee house atmosphere
might be ideal for those who shy away from rich churches and
success-seminar flashy formality. Why cant two or three meet in
Jesus Name at somebodys house just to share a cup of coffee and
chat, and see what God will end up doing? Not so women can pass
catty comments about each others clothes, hairdo and weight, etc.,
but to just the let the life of Christ flow through them. You dont see
men picking at each other about their body shape, their hair, or what
theyre wearing. Men are allowed to have coherent, rational brains
and a real personality, not just a body. Men have intelligent
conversations about important issues which matter. Why arent women
allowed, like men, to think of themselves FIRST as full-fledged humans
made in Gods image, and women second? Women have always been
pressured by society to sell themselves short. While men get to do all
the important stuff in movies and TV, women are depicted as sex-
crazed boy toys with puppy fat for brains. Why cant Christian
women, in particular, take satisfaction in being an eternal soul with
real talents and capabilities the Lord can use, instead of merely being
ornamental nonentities?

I went through some difficult days struggling to hang onto my faith

while rejecting the phoniness of rich Bless Me Clubs. Especially during
those dark years when my husband was struggling to overcome
complications from a serious work accident. I struggled to juggle too
many balls and overcome my fears. I felt like I was on the Reject Heap
of used-up Christian soldiers. After years of I confess Im blessed and
what I confess I possess, and I believe I receive when I sow a seed
to meet my need garbage, and years of sowing my best seed to
greedy preachers, what a fine reward I got, in the form of
misunderstanding from Christians who didnt have a care in the world.
Maybe Prov.22:16, a verse prosperity preachers NEVER dare mention,
was kicking in, and kicking me. I had given to the rich and reaped the
whirlwind for it. Dont EVER give money to rich preachers or you just
may end up scrounging for empty soda cans in the park just so you
can put food on the table.

The Prosperity Gospel and the way it failed me shipwrecked my faith.

It was almost gone, and what little was left was on life support.
Surely, I reasoned, if my prayers werent good enough to get Gods
attention, someone elses might be. Because I couldnt relate to those
carefree Christians, I felt like nobody on earth understood how I felt.
My despair drove me into false doctrine. I found myself an angel guru
in some tabloid newspaper, who sent me newsletters for just $5.00 a
month. Im no Catholic, but I began to pray to various saints in heaven
to intercede for me so angels would fight for me. A drowning man will
grab at any straw. Before I left a certain high-class social club church
where I got absolutely sick of prosperity preaching, the pastor, out of
the blue, said that if any of us were praying to saints they couldnt
hear us (true) and wed better quit it or wed go to hell for it.

Preachers are a mixed bag, especially when theyre cocooned from real
life and cant understand why its hard to lean on your own shoulder.
You can have the gift of supernatural knowledge operating in your life,
and be doctrinally correct in some areas. But you can lack the love of
Jesus. I Cor.13:2 says you can know everything but if you dont have
love in your life its all pointless. Instead of stopping with the going to
hell comment, the pastor should have asked WHY anyone would feel
driven to pray to dead saints, and what could be done to help them so
they wouldnt be tempted to see that as their only option. Brother B.,
a country preacher I once knew, wisely said that hogs dont wander off
and eat out of somebody elses trough if theyre bein fed what they
need. To this day I wonder whether any other people in that room
were tempted in this area, and for the same reasons I was.

Todays churchianity is nothing but staged production, a sanctification

of filthy lucre and greed so the leadership can justify the way they milk
their cash cows, then bleed them when the milk is gone.

Its Sink or Swim in todays Prosperity Theology, and if you cant

prevent expensive tragedies from wiping you out and make all the
numbers add up on an unbroken basis, youre a dropout in Gods
School of Faith, and you can just fall by the wayside. Even bands of
traveling hippies and members of Eastern cults show more care and
concern for others. They share their food and encourage one another
when times get rough. If there were no Jesus in Christianity, Id
honestly say to hell with it. Only He gives me reason to believe that
God is real, not those religious phonies who love money and scorn low-
paid peons who must struggle to survive (James 2:1-13).

I was a fool to stand up and testify how God gave me the strength to
work hard AND look after my home and ailing husband. That ultra-
right wing rich conservative preacher who warned against praying to
departed saints made a pointed dig at the fact I worked a humble fast-
food job instead of being a corporate CEO who was the head and not
the tail. At least I was working. That stuffed shirt couldnt accuse me
of not trying, even when I barely had the will to get up and face
another dreary day of hoping Tom wouldnt lose his leg to infection
while trying to stay focused at work. I wasnt cut out to be a big wheel
in the business world, and after years of being just a housewife I was
only making a few bucks part time to help put food on the table. The
rest of the time I was home nursing my poor husband and doing a
mountain of chores. We took in boarders to help make ends meet. A
couple of them were real characters. I relied on my sense of humor to
lighten my mood. My daughter, always a treasure, saw fun and humor
in everyday life, and the laughter we shared help keep us going.

One of our boarders was a Christian but a very self-righteous one. He

played trumpet at a local mega-church (for free, of course). If you
played any non-religious music on the radio hed be sure to pass a
comment and question your salvation. He believed in tithing to his rich
church while he rode a bike to work and subsisted on dry soup mix.
We invited him to have a good meal with us but he got that churchy
grin on his face and said, No thanks, all I need is simple sustenance.
So why is it such a big sin for a hard worker to eat a decent meal
theyve earned the money to buy, for Petes sake! Did he expect me to
fuel my tired body on animal feed? Didnt poor sick Tom and my
daughter need a hearty meal? Couldnt we have a little enjoyment to
boost our morale during this tough time in our familys life (Eccl.5:8; I
tim.5:18)? Jesus was no hair shirt ascetic. He came eating and
drinking wine (Luke 7:34). When my husband tried to tell that
religious guy how well his rich pastor was eating, and how he drove a
fancy car to work instead of a bike, the Christian said God would
judge him for speaking wickedness. No concern from this fellow
about the suffering Tom was already doing.

This self-righteous guy didnt get much comfort from his religion,
though. He was going through a messy divorce and was so down in
the dumps he said hed be happy if God gave him cancer so hed just
die. Where was the personal ministry at his fancy megachurch when
he needed it? He was just another free musician and contributor to
Big Religion, just another forgotten casualty in the war with satan.

The physical demands of working, plus the inner turmoil of watching

my husband suffer, handling needles dangling from IV poles, worrying
about spreading infection if I didnt keep my hands sterile enough
when I changed his dressing, etc., all these pressures just may have
made me less eager to hang around a rich church full of spoiled rich
Kings Kids who danced and sang Hebrew Christian choruses to
celebrate Gods goodness. Another myth to shatter. Give your same-
old, same-old meat & potatoes church a facelift with a dash of
Judaism, and God will be thrilled to pieces, even if your religion does
no earthly good (James chapter 2). Those people were free as an eagle
so they sang like songbirds. Ever see a heavy-laden donkey dance?
The heaviest burden I bore was disillusionment with how the church
had evolved into a circus show no longer relevant to my everyday life.
Why did I expect to see the REAL life of Christ in Name-it and Claim-it
Clubs? It was like trying to get a TV picture on a radio!

If that preacher was gonna go on bragging about his nice life, he

would do it without having me around to get jealous of him. Christians
say trials are a blessing, but thats a crock! Deut. 28:15-68 spells out
what constitutes blessings and curses. Verse 63 makes it plain that
these evil things are for your destruction, not your edification as a
Christian! Sickness, anxiety, humiliation and protracted poverty are
NOT blessings! God doesnt change His mind about whats bad and
good. Contrary to popular religious belief, God gives His children GOOD
gifts, not stones and serpents. If that thing in your life bites you like a
snake, destroys all your dreams, makes you ill and depressed, its
probably a present from the devil because its got the signature of
satan all over it, which is Steal, Kill and Destroy (John 10:10). If
hideous suffering is a blessing, why dont Christians pray theyll enjoy
more of it in heaven? Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil, not
find a sanctified use for them (I John 3:8). Some Christians have
made friends with their mountains instead of ordering them to be cast
into the sea. When satan sends you a life-shattering trial, he isnt
trying to help you grow. Hes trying to KILL ya!

Even if you do manage to get out of a really bad trial it takes a long,
long time to recover from going through it, just like it takes forever to
rebuild a bombed-out city to what it was before. You feel weepy, weary
and weak, afraid other Christians will rebuke you for being human
enough to wonder if it will all be worth it in the end. I stayed home
from those rich churches just to try to save what was left of my faith
FROM Christians! I couldnt put on a phony happy-clappy act during
the praise service without feeling phony.

Then there was this legalistic church I attended where the guest
speaker offered to pray for people. I had just returned from a long
bus trip, and my luggage had been lost. So Bro. Crumb says to me:
Are you a Christian and do you serve the Lord? Sister, I NEVER lose
MY luggage because I serve Jesus. It made me sick, and I should
have told him off and stomped out of the service. Maybe I was afraid
hed put a curse on me and my missing duds if I crossed him, so I kept
my mouth shut and let him say his little prayer over me. (Tom later
tracked down the wayward luggage in a depot in L.A.) What really
ticked me off was Bro. Crumbs treatment of a huge man who asked
prayer for his bad leg. That spiritual sadist carved him up in tiny
pieces. Bro. Crumb forced this poor man to publicly pray for Gods
forgiveness for being a glutton, without knowing anything for sure
about the mans medical history or his eating habits. It would serve
Brother Crumb right if he got some medical condition others misjudged
HIM for! I wish someone had had the guts to stand up for that fat man
and tell that preacher that God cares more about whether someones
sinny than whether theyre skinny. Brother Crumb was a nasty,
beady-eyed bully who lorded it over a worldwide kingdom of radical
churches, and it made him feel bigger to cut that unfashionably fat
guy down to size. Such spiritual authorities dont need to do mighty
miracles from God. They thrill the crowds with their Ministry of
Rebuke. That keeps them powerful and in charge, and the poor
peasants in their place, sucking up to them for their approval.

Slavish cults and country club churches arent my cup of tea. Years
later a troubled woman at work, who knew I was a Christian, asked me
to help her find a church to visit, but said she did not want to go to
any rich church. I couldnt think of a single place where we could find
the real Presence of God, just a few lukewarm institutional churches
Id passed by on the bus going home from work. We looked in the
Yellow Pages. We stopped at one or two places but didnt feel any
warmth or life there so we left and just visited with each other.

The only REAL spiritual support I got was by calling Brother B. this
preacher in Alabama who held informal prayer meetings in his home
and ministered to people over the phone. Brother B. prayed for my co-
worker, whose boyfriend was threatening to take her child away. Many
a time hed pray with me and Id see results and feel the burden lifted.
After he died, I sure didnt meet many like him. Brother B. never went
further than the Lord directed, and didnt have ambitions to launch
out into the deep (build a bigger, fancier ministry). He told me that
once he tried to hold services in a barn, but sensed that the anointing
was suffering by him trying to organize (stage manage?) the gift God
had given him. Instead of making a big, slick production out of his
ministry, Brother B. just preached whenever and wherever and to
whoever the Lord told him to.
My brother first met him in the coffee aisle of a supermarket, where a
large crowd was listening to him. Thats how I found out about him. On
short notice, Brother B. would set up informal, impromptu meetings
where a few folks whod called him on the phone would gather in his
living room. Then hed briefly share the Word and pray for their
needs. After that hed speak a blessing over our journey home. Simple
ministry from the heart, without any phony baloney sow a seed to
meet your need voodoo.

Prosperity preaching, with its inherent self-sufficiency and pride, has

BEWITCHED (Gal.3:1) Christians and robbed them of sound judgment
for far too long. But many churches DO make a heroic effort to get
souls saved, even in the absence of signs and wonders which would
prove Gods power and reality to the lost. One main problem is that
modern soul winners dont want to say anything that would make
sinners feel like sinners. God allegedly accepts each and every one of
them just the way they are, even if they intend to go on abusing
others. Evangelizing Christians tend to fudge over the basic sinful
nature of man and the need for repentance. Theyre too embarrassed
to call sin sin. This generation needs a more positive gospel so
Christians tell the lost person: God has a wonderful plan for your life
and it can be yours if only youll pray to receive Jesus into your heart.

Im not too sure, though, that God approves much of bypassing the
sticky part about that sinner needing to be brought to godly sorrow for
his sin, and his need to humbly seek Gods forgiveness and the
cleansing of the blood shed by Christ on the Cross. Spiritual abusers
like Brother Crumb have no business hanging guilt trips on people, but
many are in the dark about the fact God expects them to repent. The
sinner might take offense if you imply he isnt perfect enough to
measure up to Gods high standards. But how can Christ become
your Savior unless youre aware theres something you need to be
saved FROM and REPENT OF? And this ambiguous idiom: Have a
personal relationship with the Lord would make sinners who watch
chick flick films raise their eyebrows. Where does personal
relationship appear in Scripture? That vague term doesnt convey the
need to repent of sin and be reconciled to an offended God. People
need to know Who theyre dealing with: not some warm, cuddly teddy
bear, but the Almighty, Most Holy God, Who created and runs this
whole universe, the One Who sent His only-begotten Son to give His
life as the ONLY acceptable payment for their sins. Unless they repent
of their sins and receive Christ as Savior, the ONLY relationship God
will end up having with lost sinners will be as their angry Judge Who
sends them to hell.
Its hard to find a church which isnt dominated by Prosperity Theology.
Some churches draw heavily from the Old Testament for their doctrine
in order to justify their New Covenant (New Age) success seminar
rhetoric. Singing about the Cross is neglected while cheesy choruses
and upbeat psalms are sung (sprinkled with a lot of Hebrew idioms and
exotic melodies) about Christians running over walls, conquering the
earth in the here and now (Dominionist Theology), and gobbling up the
goodies of the wicked. As Christians go deeper by immersing
themselves in the trappings of reconstituted Judaism, sinners dont
get the true Gospel message: Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ that He
died for your sins and that He rose from the dead for your justification,
and youll receive the Gift of the Holy Ghost.

Free entertainment wont offset the negativity factor where tithing is

taught and rigidly enforced. In other books, videos and articles I go
into deep detail as to why monetary tithing was NEVER a Biblical
doctrine, and no tithing at all was taught to the Church after the Cross
of Christ nullified the Old Covenant and ushered in the New. Those
same preachers who get their people to sing about their liberty in
Christ will crack the whip when it comes to having to give ten per cent
of your GROSS income. And in Gods sight, pushing a false doctrine
for gain IS gross!

Some preachers, including one I knew as a young person, dont

actively push the tithing doctrine; just TOLERATE tithing and HARBOR
it so theyll still reap the benefits of it while escaping responsibility for
the bad repercussions of tithing in the lives of the congregation. Even
if the pastor (who went to cemetI mean, seminary) did know that
tithing on wages was never taught in Scripture, those who tithed were
never discouraged from doing so, even if Gal.3:10 warns you not to
come back under the Law and its curse for failure to keep it perfectly
in Gods way. The pastor never did attack this sacred cow. After all,
tithing was taught by other churches of our kind. The mother
churchs policy was this: Tithing may not exactly be a LAW for the
Christian, but its still one of Gods PRINCIPLES (where does Scripture
teach that popular assumption?). I looked that word up in the
dictionary. A principle IS a LAW. NOWHERE does God make it a law to
pay ten per cent of your wages to some kingpin called a pastor. The
word pastor is used only once in the New Testament (Eph.4:11).
Theres only one problem with passively endorsing false doctrine in
your church, even if you dont actively promote it. Scripture warns
believers to give no place to the devil (Eph.4:27). Only satan benefits
when false doctrine goes unchallenged. A good shepherd will chase
snakes out of his pasture, not try to profiteer off those pests. He will
WARN the sheep against coming under the Law or any part of it.
Tithing was a MATTER OF THE LAW (Matt.23:23). In this passage Jesus
was addressing a Pharisee who lived under the Law of Moses because
Christ had not yet gone to the Cross to abolish it (2 Cor.3:13;
Col.2:14; Eph.2:15).

When I was young in the Lord, I was warned not to get caught up in
legalistic customs like wearing head coverings in church, as many
charismatic churches did at the time. So why werent we warned about
the tithing error? Wellthe church building fund might have suffered.
Wherever tithing becomes a burden on hardworking families barely
scraping by, and their pastor yells at them for not doing it, their joy in
the Lord can tarnish like a rusty penny. I tend to suspect that
DELIBERATELY tolerating destructive church doctrines just because
they keep pastures green just might be one reason why Gods power
doesnt come down more often to deliver people from satan.

If youre a hippie lost in a time warp or a rugged individualist instead

of a lookalike clone, by all means avoid the prosperity mega-church
scene where wannabe business execs hang out. They confess that
theyre budding billionaires, so they dress and act the part. The rich
have usurped the meek and lowly Jesus for themselves, and given Him
a makeover. Male prosperity buffs look like theyve had their hair
mowed with a hedge trimmer, and the sides of their head are shaved,
contrary to Lev.19:27. Instead of the Old Law, theres new laws, such
as: Thy men shall wear a military crewcut and blue suit, crisp white
shirt and tie before they appear in the presence of the lord of the
pulpit. Without fail, thou shalt present ten percent of thy GROSS salary
to the Big Cheese up front. If thou hast nothing to pay, go find a
cheaper church or worship in the park!

Glum, joyless souls dig deep when the ushers come around with their
velvet bandit bags and wonder what worshipping God has to do with
filthy lucre. Some think that if you dont dress like a Wall Street
banker youll end up in hell. What would they have made of Jesus
beard and sandals?

The theory is: dress like a candidate on The Apprentice and youll
attract money like a magnet. Confess canned prosperity clichs fifty
times while you dump all your dough in the offering plate, and by next
week your Aunt Sue will die and leave you a billion bucks. This
confession obsession is trying to attain something by manipulating
some vague faith force without working for it, or respecting the
sovereignty of God. Maybe theyre too bashful to ask God for this
Saturdays winning Lotto numbers, so they just confess to the Man in
the moon instead of praying. This Positive Confession ritual is no
different from a Catholic saying a hundred Hail Marys. Sort of like
Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz tapping her ruby slippers together and
saying over and over Theres no place like home. Positive confession
is a New Age metaphysical practice which was never taught by Christ
or any of the apostles. Jesus promised youd get no results from vain
repetitions (Matt.6:7). Some Christians act like God needs a hearing
aid as they jabber the same junk over and over and over again! Why
would you repeatedly order some angelic waiter to fetch you a brand
new Mercedes, unless you keep changing the make and model?

If youre frustrated with going to a big church where youre lost in a

huge crowd and youre barely noticed, believe me, tiny groups also
have their problems. The biggest disadvantage of a very small group is
that the leadership will dissect your soul like a lab specimen to find
out if theres any human foibles they can pick at and criticize you for
with a smile on their face, of course! Reminds me of a grinning dentist
sneaking up on you with a street drill behind his back!

This one street preacher I knew was a nice man, but I got the feeling
he was proud of his perfect life, and pleased about all hed sacrificed to
obey the Lord. He claims he quit a great white collar job to go into the
street ministry. But his poor wife was all worn out from taking up the
slack.

If youre a retired person or unemployed homemaker, watch out.

Theyll make you feel guilty for enjoying this well-deserved part of your
life where you have time to live, not just exist to make the rich richer.
If you go to a storefront church where theyre lucky to get four or five
regulars, you feel mighty crummy if you dont have any money to help
defray expenses. It got interesting after I attended this tiny group for
a few months. Most of this preachers regulars hadnt shown up that
night and I guess he was bored and needed to pick at somebody for
something.

The best way to feel slimmer is to stand next to somebody ten sizes
larger. Being around imperfect people makes that particular preacher
feel much holier. He really gets a buzz out of warning drunks theyd
better get right with God or theyd fry in hell. It was poor pickings for
visitors that night, and my imperfections werent so sensational as
those of the burnt-out bums whod come to the meeting to get free
coffee and stale graham crackers. Theyd just quit coming when they
got tired of being given graphic previews of the horrors of hell. This
man was teaching an empty room, and he hadnt dished out his usual
Big Rebuke of the Night. So he had to pick and pry to find some sort of
shocking sin in my life. He said I had an odd-sounding voice and
ought to get an operation to remove tissue from the back of my throat
so the sound would come out clearer.

I told him I was from the South and a lot of folks talk with an accent
down there. Later that same evening he made a pointed dig about how
its a sin to sleep late and you really ought to drag your dead carcass
out of bed to get dressed and go to work.

All I thought was, You cant have much to do if you can get to bed
early every night and get up with the chickens. I sit up late writing or
drawing illustrations, and I tackle a mountain of dishes in the kitchen,
etc. Ive already put in enough years of waiting on cranky customers
and running my legs off. Years ago when I was cooking, washing and
running around night and day for our restaurant, some spiritual giant,
who had no job outside the home, criticized me for not doing
anything for God, so how could I claim to love Jesus? Nobody ever
walks a mile in someone elses shoes before they open their big fat
mouth and pass a comment. Well, Mr. Preacher, I figure Ive EARNED
my retirement from the daily grind, so I can finally do the CREATIVE
part of my life before the ball games all over and I start pushin up
tulips. And as for being an early bird, personally I believe God is just
as likely to hear your prayer at 6 p.m. as 6 a.m.

I really hated it when the group leader would go on and on about

something unpleasant or difficult we had to do to please God, and hed
say, Isnt that right, Pat? I just gave him a cheesy grin and nodded
my head. I hated being put on the spot like that. We have the right
to share our viewpoints with others, even to discuss some ouchy
Bible topic. But we dont have the right to invade each others inner
space, or usurp Gods bailiwick as Lord of our conscience. Beware of
preachers who put you on the spot so as to do your thinking for you,
and do it with a disarming smile. Talk about Groupthink!

His wife usually looked depressed and half-sick (whenever she showed
up), as if her religion wasnt making her very joyful. The poor woman
had no vitality about her, and her favorite topic of conversation was
dying and going to heaven so she would finally be free of her problems
and enjoy decent health for a change. Dying and going to heaven was
about the ONLY good news that preacher had for the believer.

I tend to suspect the REAL reason this preacher talked about going to
work was he wasnt working for cash anymore himself and someone
else had to finance his ministry. After quitting his own profession
(allegedly at the Lords command) he claimed God told him to rent two
different locations to hold meetings in. Obviously he needed help to
pay rents on them. He had lots of cozy tables and chairs all set out in
case people wanted to come. But he never had more than ten or
twelve at his meetings, and even that dwindled down to nothing.
Seems like if the Lord really had commanded him to rent all that space
out, God would have either filled the place up with enough contributors
or brought in some stray millionaire to shoulder the burden. That
would be a miracle in itself. Why, at least one-third of this town is on
government welfare, and if theres any rich Christians here, theyre
grazing in greener pastures.

Without realizing it, this preacher assumed the role of the Voice of
peoples consciences. As I got ready to go home, hed tell me he was
glad I could come, and smiling, hed whisper like a Father Confessor,
Do you study the Bible a lot?, or Are you walking closely with God?
Whenever hed speak to somebody like that, his voice was so velvety
and gentle, like an angels.

I reckon folks just got tired of takin the whipping and left. Softly and
tenderly he worked one staggering drunk over with warnings that his
life was bound to come to a crashing end and what if he died tonight
and went to hell? The preachers wife told me of two people whod died
recently of freak accidents. One drunk stumbled down some stairs and
died and the other got killed while someone was driving him to church.
That alone ought to have been enough to get those stubborn old sots
to sober up and see the light, but I didnt see any results when he
pestered these visitors. I got the impression that for the most part
they werent all there, and they were incapable of rational thought.

Theres a fine line between holy boldness and scaring the fish away.
Can you imagine Simon Peter lowering his net into the lake and then
beating the water with an oar while yelling at those stinkin fish to
straighten up and fly right or theyd fry in hell? Sinners DO need to
know theres a nasty, stinky, fiery Gitmo torture chamber called hell,
created for the devil and his angels. But they also need to see
GENUINE peace and joy on Christians faces, not that telltale churchy I
GOTCHA! religious grin spiritual giants put on when theyre in church.

A lot of sky pilots are so out of touch with the REAL human condition
that they remind me of hippies who tuned in and dropped out. You
look in their eyes and try to talk to them but nobodys home.

Two-faced believers might bark at their kids at home but when theyre
in church theyre sweeter than Ned Flanders in a honey pot, afraid to
ever look sad or mad. Can you imagine Jesus smiling sweetly as He
drove the moneychangers out of the Temple with a whip? Its like
these disconnected religious folks are way off on some other planet.

This sad preachers sad-faced wife was nice enough, but she never
liked to talk about common everyday activities like cooking, gardening,
hobbies, etc. She just complained about being tired from work and
lamented about different people she knew being sick, or unexpectedly
dying from freak accidents and wasnt it a good thing they prayed the
sinners prayer before they died and went to an even worse hell than
this world was. Even prayer time was full of laments and sighs, as if
their Christian life was a miserable affliction. It made you want to tell
that preacher for pitys sake, get your blessed assurance back to work
so your poor sick wife can stay home and recuperate!

One guest speaker whod come to these little meetings ran a Christian
bookstore, and hed stare at you like an owl sizing up a moth.

One night we discussed the teaching of UNCONDITIONAL forgiveness.

A sacred cow doctrine. But scripture taken AS A WHOLE, not one or
two isolated verses, must be the final authority for determining valid
church doctrine. Youll never see the word unconditional anywhere in
Scripture and throughout the Bible God Himself never once forgave
anyone unconditionally without repentance, so how can we be better
than He is? Naturally, the preacher pointedly asked each of the few
persons present whether they agreed with this teaching (at least you
can hide behind a pew in a mega-church). Silence is golden cause
you make no waves. But he kept on pressuring me to say something
till I finally spat it out: I dont believe in dispensing cheap forgiveness
like candy to people who arent sorry and would do it again. What was
I supposed to do, lie about my true convictions about something just
to toe the party line and make him feel better?

Like all people who cling to unscriptural religious traditions, he

stonewalled my valid scriptural arguments away. He said if I dont
forgive unrepentant people, even for deliberate, prolonged cruelty,
God wont forgive me. Well, I hate to disappoint the fellow, Gods
ALREADY forgiven ALL my sins (Col.2:13), and that guy will just have
to get used to seeing my smiling face up there in heaven. Im certain
God wouldnt have forgiven me if I hadnt repented first. What about
the woman taken in adultery? What if shed told Jesus Thanks for
saving my life, bud, but I gotta go, Ive got another date after He told
her to go and sin no more? Do you think Jesus could have or would
have forgiven such an unrepentant soul? In another place He said
TWICE, in the same context, If you dont repent youll perish (Luke
13:3,5). Unconditional forgiveness eliminates the need for repentance
and ensures that every scary ax murderer who ever existed goes to
heaven, even if they never feel remorse for their sins.

I believe FORGIVENESS IS A GIFT which cannot be forced out of

seriously wronged people whose abusers remain stubbornly
unrepentant. You can no more force forgiveness with threats of hell
fire than a rapist can win tender affection from a woman by
threatening a beating. If you do or give anything out of HAVING to do
it, its not done out of love and its worthless (I Cor.13:3).
FORGIVENESS IS A WORK. If you earn your salvation by forgiving
someone else, your salvation ceases to be a free gift of grace
(Rom.11:6). Jesus taught people to love and forgive AS GOD
FORGIVES US, and I had to repent first before He forgave me. I
believe forgiveness from God is a FINISHED WORK for believers, based
on Colossians 2:13: And you, being dead in your sins and the
uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him,
HAVING FORGIVEN (past tense) YOU ALL TRESPASSES. Our
forgiveness has ALREADY been accomplished! Sin has been dealt with
once and for all. When we stumble, we can go back to God and
confess to Him, with the reassurance that He restores our broken
fellowship with Him and cleanses our soul from whatever has tarnished
it. But if we dont confess and we stubbornly cling onto sin and
rebellion, the fellowship between us and God remains broken.

In Matt.5:23 Jesus says that before you offer your gift to God (Hes
speaking to Jews offering animal sacrifices in the Temple, but the same
principle applies), go make up with your BROTHER if hes got
something against you. Here Jesus is talking about a brother, or a
fellow believer, not an unbeliever. The person offering the sacrifice (sin
offering?) has done the offending and needs to apologize, or his
sacrifice will be unacceptable to God. Jesus doesnt put the burden of
asking forgiveness on the victim, like many Christians do. Todays
confession-free forgiveness heresy absolves the unrepentant offender
of all blame and responsibility and requires the victim to ask the
offenders forgiveness for making him want to hurt him in the first
place. But no matter how you bend over backwards to keep a peace
that isnt really there, unless the Christian brother who did you the
wrong acknowledges his offense and repents, that thing will always be
between you. Its like trying to hide a dead rat under the rug. Itll
always stink and make its presence known. You have to BRING IT OUT
FROM UNDER THE RUG before you can carry it out to the garbage can.

Mary, an old friend, told me a shocking story I never forgot. It was

about some man at their church who swindled several of his brethren
out of wages he owed them for helping him paint houses. It was cold
outside. All of them were hungry and one of them, a church elder, had
a wife expecting a baby. Melvin ate lunch like a king watching his
crew go without. They sat watching him gobble down thick
sandwiches and special treats. Melvin, who often boasted about his
Bible school education, refused to share even one of his cookies with
the hungry men. He refused to lend the man with the pregnant wife a
quarter so he could check to see if she was all right. The poor men
were just expected to forgive and forget, though their boss defrauded
them of their fair share of the profits. It happened to be a hard winter,
with empty fridges and high fuel bills. Melvin knew all the Bible
languages, and could analyze Greek verbs. But Melvin didnt put his
religion into practice. He never did confess his offense. He thought it
beneath his dignity to apologize for his dirty dealings. Not once did he
check to see if his men and their families were doing okay.

As for the church, the leadership was way too nice to do what Jesus
said in Matt.18:15-17. That man was never confronted with his sin by
the church. Instead, church members were admonished by the pastor
to act like the three monkeys whose names were: Hear no Evil, See
no evil, Speak no evil and just close their eyes to sin in the church.
Those who dared to criticize the unrepentant brother were condemned
by wealthier church members for being unloving or bitter. Instead
of rebuking the victim, these self-righteous meddlers could have taken
a sack of scraps over to the homes of the guilty victims who made that
man want to cheat them. Yeah, thats Christian living for you!
My friend said that her husband, a man recently converted, got so
disgusted he threw down his paint brush, told Melvin off, and went
home. Totally disillusioned about Christians in general, he eventually
lost all interest in church. Some people dont see any point in going
to church with greedy swindlers who claim to be experts on Jesus.

The standard response to those who quit church because they get hurt
by hypocrites is: Every religion, whether theyre Hindus, Moonies, or
Buddhists, has hypocrites, so thats no excuse. Theyre only human.
Maybe in some small way youre one too, so who are you to judge?
Christians are sinners saved by grace, nothing more. Besides, if you
quit church, are you going to be a church unto yourself?

But the real truth is: wherever the love of Jesus is absent, there IS no
church in any meaningful sense. Theres a vast difference between a
hypocrite who preaches holiness and wears shorts and a real
hypocrite who steals another mans wages, because far more people
get hurt by that. By attending a loveless gathering youre only
propping up a lie. If people come and get repeatedly hurt, lied to, and
rejected, why stay in the frying pan to get burnt even more? How can
you be healed unless you distance yourself from the source of the
hurt?

Some people feel frozen out and marginalized, especially solitary

adults who dont fit in with the churchs family theme. They dont fit
in with married couples or the young people, so theyre the odd one
out, and usually sit alone service after service. Subconsciously, other
Christians think theres something wrong with a woman who cant drag
her husband along to church, or they think a single man must be gay
or selfish if he doesnt settle down and start a family. Especially if he
doesnt seem to be coming to church to shop for a Christian wife.
Some Protestants think Catholic priests sin by not getting married.
But Jesus wasnt against single folks. He said some are given the gift
of celibacy so they can focus on His Kingdom (Matt.19:12).

A bullied child who is insulted and forced to sit alone in the lunchroom
everyday is forced by law to keep going back to school for more of the
same crap treatment from cruel peers and authority figures. But
being free to vote with your feet is a priceless treasure. And as for
that abusive church being your family you should never, ever give up
on, most people who had the power to do so would pack up and leave
if they were never spoken to or treated civilly by their kinfolk over a
protracted period of time.
Christians dismiss hypocrisy as a normal condition and no big deal,
since to some extent everybodys a hypocrite. But a church
controlled by spiritual abusers is a sinking ship, and its best not to let
them drag you down with it. Far from being a minor irritation and no
big deal, hypocrites were the ONLY category of sinners Jesus ever got
mad at in the NT. In Matthew 23 He softly and tenderly admonishes
them to better behavior. And no, Jesus wasnt yelling at good, loving
people who forget their manners and speak French when they hit their
thumb with a hammer. He was excoriating major league hypocrites
who turned converts into twice the son of hell as themselves.

Not all unrepented-of sins can be brushed off as insignificant. Melvin

didnt offend his brethren by forgetting to wear his deodorant. He
robbed them of money they badly needed to buy food for their
families. But he made darn sure HIS fridge was well-stocked, and all
his own bills paid FIRST, before tossing peanuts to his men. Thats
THEFT. A new convert got swindled by a more mature Christian who
claimed to be closer to God because of his great learning. There was
no rebuke from the pulpit for the Bible expert, but there WAS a strong
admonition to those who were too irresponsible to work and had to ask
for help from other Christians. An emotionally handicapped man with
a hormonal deficiency was reduced to tears because he knew that
rebuke was aimed at him. The new convert who had been robbed also
walked out. Mary emphasized how the church just ignored Melvins
mistreatment of his brethren instead of confronting him with his sin.
Kid-glove treatment is for respectable rascals who have more to give.
Reproof is reserved for the poor who cant put much in the plate.

If anything, more mature Christians should be held accountable

when their abusive behavior drives new converts away from the faith,
which adversely affects the course of their lives. Christians who defend
Christian abusers say that God expects the victim to be a strong tree
which withstands storms, shuts up and toughs it out. But a new
convert is a tender twig. As the twig is bent, so grows the tree. Even
if the victim does manage to swallow his hurt and pretend everythings
peachy, deep down he will always associate the offender with the
Christ that scoundrel claims to have in his heart. Thats unfair, but in
the case of unrepented-of outrages committed against a baby believer,
the damage is done and his faith in Christ is crippled. In view of the
fact that a more mature believer who sins grievously against a
brother could destroy the victims faith, why do Christians sympathize
with the offender while condemning the victim for his lack of love?
From what Jesus said about reconciling with your brother before
offering up your sacrifice to God, you might speculate that when the
offender doesnt repent, there just might be a blockage between him
and God. I Pet.3:7 says that your prayers can be hindered if you dont
treat your wife right. So this could apply to other Christian
relationships as well. It takes two to reconcile, not just one. You cant
be reconciled with an offender until they do their part and repent first.
To reconcile means to restore two parties to their former fellowship
with one another. If fellowship between two Christians cant be
restored until the offender repents, how much less could you
reconcile with a wicked criminal you never even met before he hurt
you or your loved ones?

Despite the fact the injured party must live with the fallout from
someone elses sins, Christians expect the victim to just forgive and
forget, or God wont forgive them (Unconditional forgiveness is a
flawed doctrine I explore more fully in another paper). But not only did
Jesus command His listeners to love their enemies, and forgive in
order to be forgiven, He required believers to be PERFECT (Matt.5:48).
That means they couldnt do any good work with less than a perfect
attitude. Their very salvation hung on it. But how perfect was the man
who defrauded his crew of their wages?

No Christian, especially a more mature believer who brags about

knowing more about the Bible than anybody else, has the right to
trigger trials of faith in the lives of his fellow believers through
his/her own irresponsible or dishonest conduct. Mary told me some sad
stories about the mess Melvin made by feathering his own nest:

1. Melvin forced his men to live by faith that the Lord would
somehow provide even if they had no money. Melvin did NOT
have to live by faith because he swindled to get his needs met.
2. Melvins men had to look for other jobs. Some had to hunt for
pop bottles on the road to cash in so they could buy food.
3. Melvin didnt give a damn about his customers. He sprayed
cheap, watered-down paint on unprepared surfaces, to enable
him to cut costs, outbid other painters, and still live high on the
hog after short-changing his men.
4. While Melvin had everything he wanted, the elders wife
sometimes skipped meals so her kids could eat.
5. Melvin gave satan an open door to create resentment and strife
in Marys church because his sin was swept under the rug,
contrary to (Matt.18:15-17).
 6. Even if people tried not to talk about it, to keep the atmosphere
sweet, the Holy Spirit was still grieved.
7. Melvins dishonesty disillusioned at least one baby believer, who
eventually lost all interest in church.

I Thes.4:6: That no man go beyond and defraud his brother in any

matter: because that the Lord is the avenger of all such, as we also
have forewarned you and testified.

Christian abusers maintain their power position by playing the

unconditional forgiveness card. They put their victims on the
defensive by saying they arent perfect either, so its a sin to criticize
their abuser. But when Christ issued His ultimatums about being
perfect, and forgiving in order to get God to forgive you, He was
speaking to JEWS UNDER THE LAW AND BEFORE THE CROSS, before
salvation through grace by faith in Christ alone was revealed to Paul.
Heres one commandment that crooked Christian couldnt have kept:
Jesus told certain ones, like the Rich Young Ruler, that they had to
keep ALL the commandments and sell ALL their possessions, and give
the money to the poor, in order to obtain eternal life (Matt.19:17; Luke
18:18-22). So it follows their salvation would not have been free, but
wages for works. Only AFTER Zacchaeus promised Jesus hed make
restitution to poor people hed swindled, did Jesus tell him that
salvation had come to his house because he was a son of Abraham
(Luke 19:8-9). Of course, no one got saved because of natural descent
from Abraham. But Jesus called Zacchaeus a son of Abraham mainly
because he did the works of Abraham after he repented (John 8:39).

Many claim Jesus didnt really mean what He said when he told Jews
living before the Cross that they had to perform the works of the Law
to obtain eternal life. But while Christ commanded the Rich Young
Ruler to sell all his possessions and give the proceeds to the poor, he
did not tell certain others, such as Nicodemus or Mary and Martha, to
also divest themselves of all their earthly goods. When Philip preached
to the Ethiopian eunuch he didnt tell him he had to sell his beautiful
chariot and take a vow of poverty in order to be a Christian. Likewise,
while Abraham was justified BY WORKS through offering up his son
Isaac (James 2:21), God did not order Jacob to sacrifice one of his own
sons to merit salvation. A test to prove personal faith could vary from
one believer to another (see Heb.chap.11).

Paul taught nothing about earning Gods forgiveness through any sort
of test of faith or works, including forgiving others. But he did teach
Christians to be patient toward all men and merciful toward one
another. If you walk in the Spirit the good works and fruits of the Spirit
will follow. Patience, or longsuffering, is one of the fruits of the Spirit
(Gal.5:22). Yet even patience has limits. You wouldnt be patient for
very long with a burglar who was creeping up the stairs to harm your
family. You wouldnt shout your UNCONDITIONAL FORGIVENESS at the
thug for what he was about to do. Youd probably yell at him to get
out and throw a pillow at him even if it hurt his feelings and ruffled his
hair.

Much of Jesus teaching on human interaction had to do with our

relationship with our own brethren, who might say or do hurtful things,
and IF THEY REPENT we forgive them (Luke 17:3). Thats just and
right. Jesus taught the brethren to love one another as He loved them.
Its a glaring, serious sin to be harsh toward a repentant brother and
withhold forgiveness from that one. But hardened unrepentant sinners
are NOT the spiritual brethren of the Christian.

I shuddered when this guest speaker prayed, And Lord, help us to

forgive everyone NO MATTER WHAT THEY DO TO US. I thought,
Please, Lord, I didnt pray that, so dont let something bad happen to
me. Have mercy on this brother or he could be severely tried in this
area to find out how sincere his prayer is.

Whenever Id look at this man I discerned a religious spirit about him.

Ive seen that expression many times before. A smug smirk which
says, Ive got you sized up, buster. I know youve got hidden sin in
your life and Im way more spiritual than you are, and Im gonna dig it
out so youll feel smaller and Ill feel bigger. The leader of this little
group always speaks in a well-modulated, churchy tone of voice and
tries never to talk about everyday things, just religious stuff. But till
Jesus comes back to get us were still made of flesh and blood. You
dont have to speak in a spooky voice or build a shrine over your toilet
to be a spiritual giant, if there IS such a thing!

When we studied Pauls epistles, he fudged over those passages which

taught the spiritual gifts. He preferred to focus on those parts which
deal with how we relate to other people. He sidestepped the miracle
issue by skipping over passages about spiritual gifts because he
doesnt believe theyre for today. But he does believe in miserable
doctrines like fasting and other forms of whipping your soul for sin.

Whenever Christians deny the need for miracles, something else has to
fill the vacuum. Some man and his own agenda take center stage.
Self-introspection deepens and people check each other for hidden
sin like a vet checks a dog for fleas. The poor man, he has two
facilities rented that nobody can pay for, the Lord allegedly led him to
quit a good job so he could save brain-dead sots with threats of hell,
his wife is half dead from being the sole breadwinner, and hes beside
himself wondering how to get the glory of the Lord to come down, so
long as God doesnt overdo it and work literal miracles. You dont
need a big mega-church to have a 3-ring circus!

Far better to worship the Lord beside the still waters.