| Author |
Message |
Lori
Registered user
Username: Lori
Post Number: 50
Registered: 11-1999
| | Posted on Tuesday, October 03, 2006 - 7:05 am: |     |
I left alone, with Christ. After 3 years of Bible study, without Adventist influence, I finally had the courage to remove the shackles which held me in the darkness of religion. It was both the hardest thing I have ever done and the most liberating.
The most difficult relationship, for me, is the one with my mother. She attempted suicide and I was blamed for it. I think the problems she has go beyond Adventism, however, I think the Adventism makes them much worse.
It saddens me to see the lack of comfort and security in all my former Adventist friends and family. I call them former because they no longer have anything to do with me.
My parents have tried but all their efforts are controlled by their fears of my damnation, hence, they reach out in manipulation and control. I am sorry to report that after 6 years of attempting to have a relationship I have had to completely cut things off with my parents. I can no longer take it. It creates constant havoc in my life. They is always an undercurrent, a pending storm, with my mother.
I realize I have no influence over them as a Christian...I have planted seeds....I have challenged what they believe...the seeds evoke anger. Our relationship is completely unhealthy, and for my benefit as well as theirs, I have ended it. They are very angry with me!!!
My father came to pick up a trailer from our house this weekend. I had not seen him since November 2005. As the biggest problems stemmed from my mother I thought he would be different without her around. I toyed with the idea of not being at home when he came...letting my "never been an Adventist" husband deal with it. But he's my dad.
When he arrived, I walked over to speak to him. He was facing sideways when I approached. I cheerfully said, "Hi, Daddy". He turned his back to me and said, "hi". He spoke two sentences to me with his back to me. When he finally turned around he avoided looking at me and looked at my husband. My 13 yr. old son came over, he approached him and hugged him.
All of my fathers comments were directed at my son and my husband. I kept looking at him and thinking, "How can you do this? I'm your daughter! You haven't seen me in nearly a year and you keep your back to me when you speak."
He glanced in my face twice. That's it.
Maybe I should have ignored his body language but it spoke more loudly to me than if he had shouted at me.
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U2bsda
Registered user
Username: U2bsda
Post Number: 202
Registered: 11-2004
| | Posted on Tuesday, October 03, 2006 - 7:19 am: | |
I'm so sorry Lori. Praying for you! |
Colleentinker
Registered user
Username: Colleentinker
Post Number: 4705
Registered: 12-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, October 03, 2006 - 3:51 pm: | |
Lori, I'm so sorry. That is so painful. Praying for you also.
Colleen |
Mwh
Registered user
Username: Mwh
Post Number: 174
Registered: 4-2006
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 04, 2006 - 11:28 am: | |
Lori, I'm praying for your parents, that God will give them wisdom to know him better and that the demonic powers which influence SDA will be loosened and they will be set free from them.
I also pray for you, that they will see Jes™s in you and your family. Amen.
Oh God your love surrounds me! |
Lori
Registered user
Username: Lori
Post Number: 51
Registered: 11-1999
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 04, 2006 - 5:30 pm: | |
Thanks so much for you prayers!!! My mother is having surgery tomorrow--please pray for her. She has told my brother to not tell me one single thing detail about her and my dad--but he told me she was having surgery!
I have been praying that God will bring some person into their lives that is Grace centered, someone they respect.
Ever since I broke off communication with them I have pray in earnest that I would know when and if I should communicate with them again. They are very angry with me because I won't respond to their comments to me but I still feel that God wants me to remain silent...I'm not his tool for this job.
I didn't realize how really angry they were until my Dad acted the way he did this weekend and my brother called tonight. My Dad e-mail me as well. I got the speech about "love". He doesn't understand how I can say I love them, and mean it, because love overcomes all obstacles.
This is really hard and I feel like I'm in way over my head.
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Agapetos
Registered user
Username: Agapetos
Post Number: 400
Registered: 10-2002
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 04, 2006 - 8:23 pm: | |
Hang in there, Lori.
I don't know what to say, and maybe I shouldn't say anything. But a few things jump out that I want to stomp on. I've felt the pain of rejection from my family, and I know a little of the lies that come with the stronghold of rejection. So I want to stomp on them for a moment. Please forgive me if I say too much.
No matter what anyone says, debate about doctrinal matters or denominations is no reason to withhold love from people. We're to love people, not reject them. I haven't experienced the same division because of faiths, but I have experienced a lot of rejection in my family. And it's a terrible thing to be rejecting someone that way in the name of God. It's possible to preach about "love" but also actually be rejecting someone or using it as a guilt-trip. If you know that this kind of abuse is going to be coming your way, it might be best to draw a healthy boundary line for your own sake. If necessary, don't read an email if you know it's going to contain something like that. God is in the business of restoring families, but that doesn't mean He wants us to put up with being abused. I know you know that, but I just wanted to reinforce what you know to be true.
If someone can do such harsh rejection over changing denominations, then the problem is not merely theological. There is a problem with love. Even if a person were to have correct "theology", the malfunction of love would still likely remain. There may likely be other roots to the stronghold of rejection. It might even be possible that your family is lashing out against these root pains and not against you per say.
Ask God to help you not take it personally (I know that sounds impossible). Rest in Jesus and in how your Father in heaven sees you. I'll pray that the malfunction of love in your family begins to heal. And for your mother in surgery. And I'm praying for you, too.
In Jesus,
Ramone |
Colleentinker
Registered user
Username: Colleentinker
Post Number: 4718
Registered: 12-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 04, 2006 - 8:39 pm: | |
Lori, I'm reminded of a story from Guideposts that I used to read to my students. A young woman was asked, after a very painful early life, to return to her home town to testify against her own father to prevent him from adopting a five-year-old girl. She was one of the only people anywhere who knew the truth about him that would protect that little girl and prevent her father from committing crimes against her.
As she flew home, her fear was mounting. She finally leaned her head against the plane window and prayed, "God, please be more real to me than my father is."
She hung onto that prayer and felt protected and strengthened. Only when she sat in the witness chair did she realize her father had not shown up for courtóit was he who was most afraid. The small child was protected.
Since reading that story for the first time probably five or six years ago, I have frequently prayed, "God, please be more real to me than___" (fill in the blank). He is completely faithfulóand He will be more real to you than the darkness of rejection and fear. He won't necessarily remove those things, but He Himself will walk through them with you.
Colleen |
Flyinglady
Registered user
Username: Flyinglady
Post Number: 2865
Registered: 3-2004
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 04, 2006 - 9:20 pm: | |
Lori,
I will put you on my prayer list with your parents and your Mom who is having surgery tomorrow.
Father in heaven, You are the I AM and the Great Physician. Send your Comforter to Lori that she may rest in your awesome arms. Her Mom is having surgery and her Dad is not talking to her. Be her parents to her. Be with the hands of the physicians as they perform surgery. Talk to her parents and let them know that Lori does love them. Guide Lori in all things and give her comfort. You are awesome all the time, God.
Diana |
Lori
Registered user
Username: Lori
Post Number: 52
Registered: 11-1999
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 04, 2006 - 10:19 pm: | |
Thank you so much for all your prayers!!!!
It's so hard because it's my parents. Scripture is very clear about believers who hold to false doctrines--you are to stay away from them. (I Cor.) But what if those people are your parents??
The worst part is: I am very happy when I don't have anything to do with them at all. I have truly enjoyed the time away from their influence. My husbands family commented over the summer that we both seemed so much more relaxed than they had seen us for years, especially me. We looked at each other knowing exactly why!!!!
Since my Mothers attempted suicide in 2002 I have had stomachaches. After a couple of years of constant problems, it miraculously disappeared for two weeks. Several months later, I had no problems for one week. Every few months I would have a brief reprieve.
I was desperately trying to find a common link. Perhaps something I had not eaten/or had eaten during those periods.
It wasn't until my parents were gone to Europe for three weeks that I figured it out. Every time my stomach problems disappeared it was because they were on a business trip with the GC!!! Meaning, she wasn't calling me all the time and I wasn't having to see them.
I know that's sounds really bad...but I've enjoyed staying away from their chaos. It makes me physically sick.
My brother gets really irritated when I tell him I'm not going to have anything to do with them until something changes. He told me tonight they were never going to change and if that's what I was waiting for then I going to have to wait for them to die.
No matter what I do, in regard to them, it's the wrong thing. My mother gets mad after she talks to me or sees me. I'm trying to walk on eggshells to avoid a conflict; the conflict happens anyway. I'm happy when I can be separated from them. I feel better physically which is better for my husband and my kids. I just don't think that's "wrong". It's really better for everybody...except my Mom...she's mad when she's not around me...and in turn my Dad is miserable because my Mother is hell to be with.
I suppose the only people enjoying it are me, my husband and my kids. So, am I supposed to make all of us miserable just so my mother can have her way???
So this is where my father gives me the guilt-trip about "love".
What about the part "love does not push itself on others"?? Why do people who use this passage always forget about that part?
Why do they slap you with "honor your parents" when the husband is supposed to be the head of the wife?? In this situation I can't do both. Is my allegiance not to my husband??
I know they are fearful of my demise because I have left the Adventist church and the only thing that will change this is if I go back (or pretend to) or if they have a change in their way of thinking.
Thank you all for your prayers. I have found comfort in them!!!
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Snowboardingmom
Registered user
Username: Snowboardingmom
Post Number: 178
Registered: 11-2005
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 04, 2006 - 10:53 pm: | |
Colleen -- Wow! What a powerful prayer "God, please be more real to me than...." is!
It's amazing to think of it from that perspective. God IS really bigger, and more real than anything we go through. What an incredible thought. Although the situations, fears, doubts, etc. can be overwhelmingly enormous at times, those things are completely dwarfed by God. Awesome!!
Ramone, what you said is so true! I often think about what I would do if my child gave up on Christianity and decided to leave it. The LAST thing I would do would be to reject them, or criticize them, or withhold love from them. As I've witnessed the reactions of my family and friends to us leaving Adventism, I can't help but think how screwed up it is!! Like you said, this goes way beyond being just a "theological" problem.
The stories of rejection on this forum are not only too familiar, but their eerily similar. This is not normal behavior in general (parents and friends don't just suddenly disown you or reject when they are truly "concerned" about you), and definitely not normal behavior from believers and Christ-followers. There is definitely a spiritual bondage on the Adventist denomination. This is more and more clear to me.
I'm praying for you, Lori. |
Tricia
Registered user
Username: Tricia
Post Number: 9
Registered: 3-2006
| | Posted on Wednesday, October 04, 2006 - 11:10 pm: | |
I can so relate to many of the situations with family, including children and one's parents that have been "discussed" tonight on diff. threads. Oh, Lori, I so understand and will pray for you and your Mother's surgery. I'am the only leaving SDA in my family. My husband was brought up SDA and my two children, ages 14 (daughter) and my 10 year old son were baptized in the SDA church about a year ago. It's so difficult getting them to believe differently. My husband hasn't been going to church in a while. The children go with me to a Baptist church. The MAIN souce of contention in leaving the SDA church is my Mother!! I can't describe everything she says to myself and the children. I have stopped allowing my daughter to spend the night with her on Friday nights because it's even making her obstinate to me about everyday decisions. I just about have to be in the room at all times when she is with them. This is very sad, because she is 78 yrs. old now, and they need her, just as she needs them.
I have just been amazed at the strong-hold of the Adventist beliefs that I grew up in. It is quite sad to let a denomination choice come above EVERYTHING---above to know Jesus, your family, etc... If I talk about ANYTHING in the Bible, she says I must stop that it makes her physically ill (even to read favorite Bible texts). It is very sad, especially if you knew the kind of person my Mother is,otherwise. Her obversion to any other church is phenomenal. She has gotten even more active in the SDA church since my Step-Dad past away in April. She puts a real guilt-trip on me for not going to church with her, now that she is living alone for the 1st time. He was my "Dad" to me;they were married 35 years.
I just feel so bad that it's this "elephant in the room" during all of our visits, and even phone calls.
I will pray for the posters and their families on here, daily. This forum means so much to me. It's probably been a year and a half since I've been journeying out of Adventist. I do not hold to any of their doctrines anymore, after alot of prayer and reading the Bible, especially the NT. I met Jesus in a wonderful, can't even explain way. Next, I researched on the internet alot---and that was amazing--- and ordered Dale Ratzlaff's books---Sabbath in Christ and Cultic Doctrine. These two books helped my tremendously
I really like the new church we're attending. I can hardly wait from week to week to return. It is Spirit filled in a way that I've never experienced.
Anyway, thank you Colleen and Richard, for having this form. It is a true treasure. Thank everyone who posts. You all have blessed and helped me many, many times.
Tricia |
Lori
Registered user
Username: Lori
Post Number: 53
Registered: 11-1999
| | Posted on Thursday, October 05, 2006 - 6:39 am: | |
The Elephant in the Room. That's so true!!!!
What gets to me is my mother makes an issue of the elephant in the room, adds two or three MORE elephants, and the next time you see or talk to her she acts like it never happened. Then she wants to know...."What's the matter with you?"
Last school year, I led out a Bible Study in my home which covered 2 Corinthians. The day we were to go over our study of Chapter 6; I felt a strong urgency of what I thought was a need to study about 30 minutes before the ladies began to arrive.
I felt very prepared for the study and didn't understand why I had this "feeling"...it was strange. I did pick up the material to go over it briefly, to make sure I had the historical context at my fingertips, etc., and I briefly re-read the chapter and prayed that God would give me the words I needed as I studied with these ladies. What really stood out with me when I re-read it was a phrase in verse 8 "genuine, but regarded as imposters". I underlined it. And also, verses 14-18.
My phone rang just as I finished. It was my Mother! She was in one of her argumentative moods....she was ready to make an issue of the elephant.
I immediately told her, "Mother, this is not a good time, my Bible Study ladies will be here in about 5 minutes." (That was the wrong thing for me to say for it enraged her.) She would not stop; she would not wait. I would interrupt her to say, "Mother, people have pulled in my driveway.....people are walking in my door....Mother, I have to go. Her last words nastily commanded me , "Well, you call me when they leave."
She won!! I was so upset over her phone call I couldn't cover the material at the study. Fortunately, only two ladies attended that day and they were my closest friends...they ended up comforting and ministering to me.
I never called her back. I wrote her a letter explaining to her that I would no longer allow her to disrespect me in that manner. I cited only 3 other specific incidents (out of 1,000's) where she had done similiar things by not respecting my decisions and pushing her way around.
The response I received totally ignored the content of my letter (lack of respect for me as an adult).
Her reply was. "I am sorry for any misunderstandings there seem to be."
She never acknowledges what you say or write....she ignores. My aunt and my brother both confirmed to me that she sees that she has done nothing at all wrong...nothing at all to disrespect me as an adult. How can you communicate with someone when they will never address what you say?
That particular study was one of the most difficult ones I have ever done just because of my mothers behavior. My difficulties regarding my parents religion became a living example of everything I was studying. I worried about what these ladies thought about me spiritually because of the battle I was in with my mother.
One lady remarked to me, "I have never seen spiritual warfare like this before."
These ladies have no background in Adventism..infact, there is no Adventist church in my town. It was difficult for them to understand what would cause my mother to act the way she was. As I tried to example the fears which governed her actions they would say, "I don't see how you ever got out of it."
It is amazing anyone ever escapes it and embraces Christianity. It's only by the grace of God that it happens and it only happens when the person is SEEKING TRUTH. It only happens when the soul possesses a positive attitude to the word of God yearning for unadulterated truth.
This website was an affirmation for me; I never knew until I found this website that other people were on the same difficult journey that I was. I felt very alone. I was also still very fearful that I was being deceived.
I still feel alone sometimes but the spiritual walk is a solo with Jesus Christ. It's something you do alone with Him. |
Mwh
Registered user
Username: Mwh
Post Number: 179
Registered: 4-2006
| | Posted on Thursday, October 05, 2006 - 3:03 pm: | |
Lori, I almost cried when reading your post. It is really about recognizing that we are fighting a spiritual battle, not the persons themselfs. Oh how glorious it would be to see you mother liberated from the bondage of evil spirits embracing you in the spirit of love, our Lord Jesus.
Hallelujah to you Jesus, my Lord and God! |
Tricia
Registered user
Username: Tricia
Post Number: 11
Registered: 3-2006
| | Posted on Thursday, October 05, 2006 - 5:03 pm: | |
Lori, I so understood what you were saying in your post. I can really appreciate everything that you said. You've been in a very difficult and hurtful position.
Yes, people in other churches just can't phantom the reaction that SDA's have when one leaves their denomination. My mother's reaction has really emphasized the "cultnesss" of it.
I want to thank everyone who posts on this forum, again. |
Colleentinker
Registered user
Username: Colleentinker
Post Number: 4726
Registered: 12-2003
| | Posted on Thursday, October 05, 2006 - 5:14 pm: | |
Lori, I understand your situation. You are doing the right thing in setting boundaries with your mother. God clearly gave you the insight of "genuine, but regarded as imposters". Think of how the PHarisees accused Jesus of being an imposter!
And Jesus did not maintain intimate relationships with the unwilling Pharisees. Remember in Matthew 12, when they accused Him of casting out demons by the power of Beelzebub? After that (and after telling them that attributing the power of the Holy Spirit to Satan was the unpardonable sin), Jesus began speaking to them in parables. He no longer plainly taught them the truth about Himself.
Instead, as he would frequently say, "He who has ears, let him hear."
Mwh, you said it so clearly. We are in a spiritual battle; the flesh and blood of our families and friends are not the true enemies. We are receiving the onslaught of the rulers and authorities of this dark world and of the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms (Ephesians 6:10-12). We need to dress ourselves in God's armor every day so we can withstand the devil's schemes (Ephesians 6:13-18.
Colleen |
Melissa
Registered user
Username: Melissa
Post Number: 1490
Registered: 7-2003
| | Posted on Friday, October 06, 2006 - 2:31 pm: | |
Oh my, Lori. The names are different, but the arguments are the same. How weird is that! |
Flyinglady
Registered user
Username: Flyinglady
Post Number: 2872
Registered: 3-2004
| | Posted on Friday, October 06, 2006 - 4:06 pm: | |
Lori,
I can understand what you are going through as I am having that "spiritual warfare" with a sister. It is not about my change in churches. It is about family relationships. But Satan will use anything.
I recognized the spiritual warfare a year ago and am so thankful God showed me what it was.
That sister and I are going to counseling together on Oct 21, 9 AM. I have asked for prayers in the prayer section for that session.
Colleen, you are so right on when you say we need to dress ourselves in God's armor every day so we can withstand the devil's schemes. How true that is.
Continuing to pray for you Lori,
God is awesome and He is in charge.
Diana |
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