This Church Affected My Entire Life . . . .
My parents professed when I was eight years old so I grew up in "the truth" and I stood to my feet in a convention at age fourteen because my mother told me to. I never ever felt I had a relationship with God. I did what I was supposed to because my parents expected me to and they were very quick to report me to the workers if they didn't think I was obedient enough, humble enough or willing enough.
When I was twenty years old I went to another city for my nurse's training and lived in residence. It was very easy to drift away from the church and great fun to wear lipstick and jewelry, cut my hair, and listen to the radio. I married a non-professing man, had two boys and raised them in the Baptist church. I had gone to several different churches; I finally chose the Baptist church because they seemed to have a love for God and for each other and they baptized by immersion. It was the closest I could find to "the truth." I never for a moment thought any of them would go to heaven--I had been brainwashed all my life to believe "only through the truth." My children needed some religious instruction so I chose a church I felt would be good for them but I myself wouldn't join it and I would never take part in communion because I had a great fear it would be a terrible sin. I truly believed the "truth" was the ONLY way; I just wasn't willing to obey all the unwritten rules.
In 1986 I became very ill with Myasthenia Gravis, a neuromuscular disease. A year later my husband and I separated. I was a wreck physically, mentally, emotionally, financially, spiritually and any other way you can think of. After 43 years of being absent from "the truth" the workers started coming around to visit and the friends invited me to coffee parties. I began going to informal Bible studies with them as well as Gospel meetings.
A few months later I broke my arm and my leg and spent many weeks in a wheel chair in hospital. I developed blood clots in both of my lungs and was in Intensive Care. I realized I could very easily die. I did not want to die without making things right with God and the only way I knew how to do that was to re-profess. One morning at six o'clock I asked a nurse to call my nephew and tell him I wanted to see my minister. He would know where the workers were. By 8 a.m. they were at my bedside. I don't remember what was said but I remember a feeling of peace. When I recovered and returned to my home my leg was still in a cast but the friends would pick me up for Sunday morning meeting. Even though I never stood up in a tested meeting it was considered that I was professing again. Time went on but I never really felt I had a relationship with God although I so desperately wanted one. I thought if I was reading my Bible, praying, going to meeting, someday I would be in the right place at the right time, and like Saul of Tarsus it would happen to me. It never did but for five years I kept pretending, hoping, praying and becoming more and more lonely and disillusioned. The friends were no longer interested in an old, sick, poor woman. I didn't fit into any of their groups.
Two years after I professed my 39 year old son died suddenly. Two sister workers did come to see me that afternoon but not one other person in the whole city (twelve meetings) phoned me or visited me. No one put their arms around me and said they were sorry. I received two cards from professing people, dozens from non-professing former friends and co-workers. There were even unexpected flowers. My son wasn't professing so it seemed it didn't matter that he was gone and I was bereft.
That started my doubts as to the kind of people these so-called "friends" were. If they were God's children and didn't love me then I came to believe God didn't love me. I became terribly depressed. My Myasthenia grew more incapacitating and I started missing meetings. I felt I had nothing to take for a testimony. I was too unworthy to take part in communion. I was too embarrassed to be there and not have a part. It seemed no one missed me. I was desperate to stay in. I didn't want to be out. I decided to travel to visit my professing aunt and uncle and long time professing friend hoping they would help me. Instead I was lectured. I was made to feel it was my fault and that I needed to get back to meeting, to pray more, to read more. I felt ashamed and that God could never love me nor would He want me to be part of His family. I wrote to my elders, who were also my niece and her husband, telling them I would no longer be going to meeting but I hoped that there could still be a family tie. I wrote to a few others telling them I hoped we could still be friends. No one responded. When I returned home no one phoned to say "can I help, are you in trouble?" No one called, no one visited, not even ONE worker. I didn't really want them to contact me, but was very surprised when they just let me go without even trying to find out why. I was even more surprised to find people I sat next to in meeting passed me in the street without even a greeting. Now I know that is what is done to someone who leaves. It is called shunning.
I really thought I was condemning myself to hell when I stopped going to meeting so it was as though an enormous weight was lifted when I found out the so-called "truth" was started by a man named William Irvine in 1897 and the whole thing was based on his rules and regulations. It was all a sham--not handed down from Christ at all but a cult where control was tightly maintained through fear. Ask a question and you were accused of being unwilling, use your own discretion and your part in meeting would be taken away.
I left "the truth" three years ago and now I have a wonderful sense of freedom--no guilt, no fear. I go to different churches, love the music, and enjoy the Christmas and Easter celebrations. I still have a very real problem accepting that salvation is God's free gift to us. I have too many years of believing my salvation depends on how good I am, how long my hair is, whether I wear slacks, or if I have a TV. I seem unable to choose one church and settle there, but I don't believe it is important to do so.
This church affected my entire life. Even though I was away from it from the age of twenty to sixty-four I was still controlled by it. Now I'm happy to be free of that bondage and to know that God loves me unconditionally.
4/96
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