Why I Left the Church

I have left the church.

I am breaking all of the rules.

I have freed myself from the binding chains of religion.

And I have never been happier.

I can’t say that I’ve felt the physical hands of another human being around my neck strangling the life out of me, but I have felt the unhealthy spiritual hands of religion choking the very air out of my lungs. I was dying. 

For years I thought that I was just jaded, and I would lie awake at night wondering if this was the church that Christ really died for. Please don’t get me wrong, yes He died for the people in the church, despite their attitudes. But for the current institution of the church, I believe that it is far from the church that Paul the Apostle knew when he walked the earth.

Beloved, there is a strangling taking place. True undefiled religion is dying out before our eyes. Before us we have big churches, with big congregations, with big paychecks… but with small relationships and petty setbacks with the things that matter most on this earth… PEOPLE! 

My precious husband and I have watched from a distance as that one virtue was passed up over and over again. Each time I would hear the verse where Jesus talked to Peter around the fire after He rose from the dead, “Peter, do you love me? Yes, Lord; you know that I love you. If you love me, than feed my sheep.” It was so important to Jesus that he repeated himself THREE times to Peter. I figure to reiterate it as many times as Peter also denied Christ, but also to remind him the importance of loving PEOPLE. 

I think that we have all been the forgotten, the overlooked and under appreciated. Some have said to us to be that which you lack in your life. That our hearts should certainly desire to love others when we have yet not been fully loved or fully accepted. While I don’t think it’s impossible to love fully those around us without being loved, it seems that there is a great lack in that equation. Because those that said those very words have been the very ones who did not practice what they preached. I believe that people should be invested in, loved on and gone broke over! I believe that Jesus walked this very earth with that desire and purpose before His eyes and Paul was his very echo. 

Beloved, there is a cure! A simple and painful cure. It is called vulnerability. The very present action of bringing yourself from beyond the shadows and into the light. See buildings are full of shadows where things can hide, and I think that's what has happened in the church for so many years. We have found the dark spots where light no longer shines, and we feel safe there. But beloved, you are missing the greatest piece of the puzzle. Oh to love and be loved in return! What a beautiful picture of the life that Christ came to fulfill on this earth.

Come out from among them!

The days of building church buildings, television programs, book deals and large ministries is over. I believe with my whole heart that the desire of this man I love Jesus, is to love people and love them WELL. I came to know Christ because of one who loved me well… one who loved me well into the midnight hour when I needed the love of Christ to change me. Almost every defining moment that I’ve had in my Christian walk has been when the body of Christ has come alive to meet the needs of a broken world, and usually it happened around a kitchen table with some good food! NOW THAT’S the CHURCH!

So I’ve left the church, and I won’t be going back. I will no longer tie myself to the unnecessary bonds of religion which tell me to do things in order to be loved and cared for. I’ll love regardless of whether or not I’ve been loved, but I will not tie myself to those with empty words of investment. 

I am taking a cue from Elvis and I am leaving the building.

It is time to come around tables and love deep into the night with vulnerable and joyful hearts.

Will you join me?

*Disclaimer: Jonathan and I have not left the assembly of believers, I am simply talking about the institution of religiosities.*

The Peace of Uncertainty: Miscarraige

***After I have spent some time with the Lord about this, I feel led to share. This month, the month of October, is infant loss awareness. Though I wasn't far along at all it still has shaken me in a way that I would have never expected. I would hope that in the light of all this Planned Parenthood business and the #shoutyourabortion hashtags, we would see women arise and #shoutyourbirth. Whether the conception ends in miscarriage, still birth or a thriving healthy baby, it is still a miracle and a life to be celebrated****

                      

   

I was laying in bed this evening and I could feel my heart literally breaking in my chest. I tried to sleep and shake it off, but I knew that the Lord wanted me to get this off of my chest. I've been an island to myself, and I am learning to lean in this wilderness. 

You are faultless in your very nature, yet You understand the human mind...

And so I breathe here in the mystery. In the mystery of loss and fighting to find the gain. 

Little Gift,

Though your presence was not given to me by some positive test, something in my body knew that you were there, and as I felt you leaving me I knew that there was some greater plan for you, by a much greater God. I felt that I failed you, and that I failed myself. The questions are unrelenting and I haven't come to some great understanding yet. But know this, I love you deeply. I justify you as a real life, that died a real death. Though you were never earthside, I know that one day when your daddy and I step into eternity we will see you. And though we didn't get far in our relaitonship, it doesn't change the way that I immensly love you. 

You child, are a gift. 

For God works everything for the good of those who love Him.

I am trying to find my peace in uncertainty. 

I have pushed my husband and marriage to a place that I am ashamed of. I have kept him at arms length for fear of breaking into a million pieces. The one that holds my heart most closely on this earth and I am afraid to just break down with him. I have kept quiet. I didn't know how to talk about this, I didn't know how to mourn about this. Some deep dark voice told me to be quiet, that it was just some horrible moment in time to be forgotten. But that is a lie, and I know truth, and He is close. My heart longs for motherhood. The questions of loved ones and strangers push at the little hole in my heart reminding me that it's there. And my body flushed me clean of life and I don't know why. I want to be a vessel of life. I want to fulfill my purpose on this earth. And yet, I bled.

But there is a better blood.

He bled. FOR ME!

Your steadfast love, O Lord, extends to heavens, your faithfulness to the clouds.

Miscarriage is an ugly shadow. The church doesn't talk about it, and women don't justify it. But I am deeply pained over it. I don't understand it, I can't comprehend it, but I trust that God is good and He will get me through it. The enemy would have me keep these words that are welling deep within my soul to myself, but I have to get it out before it eats me from the inside out. 

Your love is a furry all it's own, sweeping dust and turning feet towards home... You are kind. -Amanda Cook

My eyes are towards heaven. I am not asking for kind words, or some display of beautiful love or mercy to beset me. No, I want to give women who have miscarried a voice. Your pain is real. Your loss is real. What happened was real. A real life, taken from a real mother, without real answers. And the answers may never come while we remain on this earth, but one day when you step into heaven you will see clearly. 

But while you're here dear daughter in the trenches, I challenge you to sit down and write out your story. Don't be afraid to shout your testimony from the roof tops. God is still in control of it all.

I believe.

You turn the bitter into sweet.

***i was listening to Amanda Cook's album Brave New World, it has been a beacon in the darkness during this time.****

The Battle Within

There's a cry rumbling from the deepest parts of my soul. I can feel as it shakes me wide awake. It's been a long time since I've listened to the cry. 

It started as I saw myself standing shattered before Him. Like velvet His voice whispered to my soul, "Baby girl, are you okay?" With eyes wide and heart abandoned I look up at Him and say "No, I'm not okay." I. Am. Not. Okay. And He nods in full acknowledgement of that fact that He already knew. In His sovereign love, He knew. I am left undone, standing with feet cold on sea of glass and I know that this is only the beginning. 

My not okay-ness is rousing my soul to ask soul-stirring questions that demand answers. Answers that only lead to more questions. Sunsets that only lead to more sunrises. The day in, day out mundane is being blown apart by this realization that I am not okay right now. It's not a "I'm not okay, please help me.", it's a "I'm not okay, don't help me, this is how it's supposed to be!" This small moment of clarity has shown me the depth of my incoherency for the last midnight hour. But oh beloved, how the sun does rise!!! 

The Church is TOO okay. He is whispering that same deafening question to her, but instead of responding in a way that would provoke a depth charge she instead smooths over the question. What this beautiful bride doesn't realize is that she is not okay, and although her bold-faced statement in lieu of brokenness cries "DON'T WORRY ABOUT ME, I AM OKAY!" Her heart cries in reality "I am not okay!" I know. I know this cry.

I am her. I have been her, this broken bride. And now I wait and listen for the sound of the cry to arise. Here in this moment of coherency, I can hear loudly the true cry of my heart. I am not okay that the church hurts in a way she has never before with unprecedented numbers of uncaring members. I am not okay that the plumb line has been removed in light of rising tolerance. I am not okay that love has been replaced by some faux fairy tale of a Christ that won't judge sin. I am not okay that my heart BURNS to be loved!! I am not okay that I have yet to see the more.

You see this is the battle within my soul, to sit idly by while inside I am dying. Dying to know why I am not okay. Dying to know why He already knows how to ask me the questions that provoke me to burning. He is pushing me to provoking... provoking His bride to awaken from this slumber and find peace in the "not-okayness" of her heart. 

I challenge you beloved, if you are "okay" with where you are let Him ask you if you're okay. Let Him prod your heart into a place of heat. Warm your soul to Him, hunger and thirst again. There is peace in not being satisfied. 

Faithful To The End

Dreams and passions are often closer than we believe... and with our eyes so focused on the "future" we miss the budding flower that has sprung up right before our eyes. In this moment, I will not be found amiss.

I feel like I have settled down with a marriage proposal, realizing the inevitable that is right before my eyes... and that the commitment that I have made will be for the rest of my life. It's like getting cold feet right before your wedding, except this isn't my wedding and my feet aren't exactly cold, because they've already gotten a little bit wet with the prospect of my future. I am realizing right here in this moment that God is bringing me full force into my destiny, and the more days that pass the closer I realize I am to what God has been speaking into me since the beginning. How did I end up here, and how did my life go from a train wreck waiting to happen to walking in the fullness of grace? How His mercy abounds so greatly in our lives!

My passion for this generation has been fueled by the hurting and the lost that are out there, and mostly for the young girls and women that are out there without a hope in the world. For the last nearly 3-4 years my venue has been a church building every Wednesday and Saturday-Sunday, and the occasional high school lunch table meeting. And although there are dark places inside of both of those walls I knew that there were darker places that God was calling me to... there were back alleys, houses and clubs where that darkness was so thick that one's eyes might not see the possibility to move in love and grace. But I know the possibilities are endless, God is just waiting for one to stand up and say "Send me, I'll go." Just as Isaiah had his experience with the glory of God in chapter 6, I knew that I wanted a similar commissioning... I just wasn't sure if I could handle the whole "near-death-I-just-saw-God" experience, after all, I am an American, and those kinds of experiences aren't really talked about in church... let alone anywhere that I know of.

So anyways, God reveals unto Isaiah how unworthy he is and that his lips are unclean and just shows him really who's Boss... and after letting Isaiah know what's up He says to him "Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?" and Isaiah says "Here I am! Send me." And from the temple God sends him out full of the fear and I believe, love of God. And thus began my prayer of God commissioning me to go out and do what HE wanted me to do... not of my own will, or of any of the influencer's in my life... but truly what HE wanted. It was funny that after praying that prayer he not only commissioned me, but saved me too... yes, friend you heard me right... I got saved. My life's desire has been that to show love to a lost and broken world... but before I could do that, God had to show His love to a lost and broken me.

Enter my commissioning/salvation story:
On December 27th, 2009 I left on a trip to Kansas City and IHOP (International House of Prayer) to go to the OneThing09 Conference with Jen and Jacob, two of my spiritual parents and leaders from Heartland. It was a complete God appointment that I was even able to get a week off of work with nearly no notice, but I was headed for a full-on encounter with a God that I had NEVER encountered before, even in my deliverance from drugs. I got there not expecting that God was going to do more than just let me leave with another conference "high"... He was going to make sure that I walked out of that center with a life change, and so much so that I would NEVER be going back... after all, is that not true salvation? Anyways, to make a long story short, Misty Edwards preached on December 29th, 2009 about the amazing love of the Father, something that I had never connected with. I don't remember much else from her message, but that there was a lot of love there, and that I wanted to know this God... I wanted to know the God of love that came and gave His ONLY son for me... a love that stretched out his arms and died. That night after she preached with such mercy, grace and love on her life, I went down to the altar, not knowing the deep work that God was about to do in my life. I didn't listen to the altar-call requirements, I just knew that when I went forward God was going to do something in my life that I had been searching for for a long time, but just didn't know how to access it. There at the front of that conference center I was smacked by heaven... my heart was weighed down with something entirely new, and so out of the norm for what I was used to. Love. There on that floor in front of 20,000 people God decided to do a deep heart work on me. He saved me. My relationship for the last 3 years prior to this moment had been on the basis that I "knew" Him, and I am entirely certain that He did not, in those times, know me. My works and religion had stolen me away before I could even encounter the Father. The walls came crashing down like someone had put dynamite all around my heart and scheduled to set it off right at that very moment. I was broken... with a purpose.

On December 29th, 2009 I found my purpose, and my destiny was made clear. I was made to love, and be loved by Him. My idea of evangelizing and sharing the gospel had changed, and my every moment was now consumed by the FURIOUS love that overtook my life one night in December. The gospel was no longer head knowledge or how much I could go back and forth between the unbeliever, but rather the gospel message was a message of love... a message of hope and redemption, just like he found me there on the floor of that conference center. In fact I know that beyond a shadow of a doubt it was not the scriptures that I had already memorized that saved me in that moment, but rather it was the drawing of the Spirit unto the Father, and His love that redeemed me from the place that I was in. And just like Isaiah I was picked up from the place that I was in... and commissioned with a new message to share with His children; love.

Love is the motivating force behind the commissioning upon my life. I know that in the darkest places love shines the brightest and through the fear and the doubt I will press on knowing that it's the love of Christ that redeems all from the darkness that we are all in at some point or another. This love will reach the girl that feels like she has nowhere to turn. This love will reach the girl that has never been loved by any human being before. This love will go to the alleys, houses and clubs and it will break down all walls because I know that it's this love that was the motivating force behind the Cross of Jesus.

So here I stand, in reality a newly saved person, yet not a babe in Christ... and this ocean is massive before me... and the grains of sand that are but people upon the shores need to know this love that God has ready and available for everyone. Our eyes have yet to truly see this man who is full of love that burns with fire in His eyes... and He desires us to see.