My Pharisectomy

In my own experience, religion has been the scourge that has destroyed relationships in my own life. Those who cling to doctrines, scriptures, and their pet dogmas destroy those around with them. 

I was raised a Pharisee and learned the “right” things to say to any situation using scripture or theology that was taught to me by my dad or school teachers or pastors. My dad spent his life studying scripture, end-times theology and conspiracy theories. I went to private “Christian” schools for all but the 3 years I was home schooled. And of course there was church. 

In school, I loved it when I could spew out the “right” theology and get the nodding approval from my teachers. In church, I learned how to put on my church face, smile, and act like I was there to serve God. Maybe I really did want to serve God, I don’t know these days, my memory gets a little fuzzy. 

Fast forward to about 2 years ago. 

This was the time I was beginning to question things. I was playing bass with the worship band at the church we were apart of. While searching for answers I stumbled upon a series of booklets put out by an “organic church” in Indianapolis, Indiana. There were maybe a dozen booklets total ranging from 80-100 pages each. Oh, these had all the answers. I gobbled them up. I couldn’t put them down. To me, at the time, these seemed to give me all the right and wrong ways to “do” the Christian thing. 

Here is a basic break down of what the booklets talked about:

1. Organized meetings of any kind were not led by the Spirit.

2. You had to have regular meetings that focused on Christ or you weren’t really apart of the “true” church. (sort of conflicts with #1, I think)

3. These meetings could not have any sort of agenda, they were just supposed to flow and be lead by the Spirit. If they didn’t then there was something, maybe sin or whatever, that was hindering Christ from being made visible.

4. You had to get your own “revelation” of Christ, and until then, you were not saved. And they couldn’t explain things to you until you had your revelation.

5. You had to have a “brother” or “sister” with you at all times during the day to keep you from evil or temptation. There were exceptions, like if you were the only believer at your workplace. They actually encouraged people to look for jobs as groups so that you could have “2 or more” at a workplace and therefore bring the church to the world. (as I’m typing this out, it’s striking me more and more how awful all of this stuff is)

6. You had to show fruit in your life (Although these booklets never really shared what this fruit was and even said that there could be counterfeit fruit) or you were never a believer in the first place and you would be cut off from the “vine” or the true church.

7. It was the true church’s responsibility to do the cutting off. If someone was not showing fruit after a time, even if they were trying, you were to bring it before the church leadership and they would formally “break fellowship” with this person so as not to allow tares to grow up with the wheat.

8. Christ was coming back to claim His bride and those who were not part of the “true church” would be cast into outer darkness for eternity.

9. The way is narrow and few find it. 99% of people who ever lived or are alive now will burn in hell for eternity because they would not embrace the true church. 

The last couple of points really scared me when I read it. I knew I had to get my ducks in a row. So, like a good Pharisee, I tried really hard. I knew I had to get this “revelation” that they talked about. So I prayed, I studied the bible, I made promises to God that I would take the reigns of my house and lead my family to the truth. I would get rid of the TV, because the eyes are the window to the soul and any TV program is pure evil (They actually taught this, then I found YouTube clips that they had put out so people could watch. How ironic. Oh, and the internet should be avoided because of the temptation of pornography, even though all this material was distributed solely on the internet). I was going to spend every waking minute either studying the bible or witnessing to others. After all, I had to warn them of the coming judgment.

Well, needless to say, I kind of freaked my wife out a bit. I did a very poor job of communicating with her and pretty much left her out of the loop. She would ask me what was going on and I would point to those booklets and say “just read those, they say it better than I could”. That didn’t go over well. She wanted to know what I was going through, and I shut her out. It was immediately destroying our marriage. But I was told in those booklets that I would lose family and friends and jobs and all I had for Christ’s sake and that I would reap rewards in Heaven. 

I decided to quit drinking and told my friends that I couldn’t hang out if there was going to be alcohol present. So here I was loosing my friends too. Everything in my life was falling apart and I don’t think I’ve ever been more miserable. Now I look back and think, “How did I think that this was the “Life abundant” and “easy yoke” that Jesus spoke of? 

I honestly don’t remember when things turned around. It didn’t take long. For all of my zeal and good intentions, I could not keep the act up. It all came crashing down. I have to stop and say that it was most definitely my wife that brought about a change in my heart. I remember the long and intense discussion we had when I finally started to snap out of this phase and I realized, no matter what the consequence, I’m not giving up my family for this supposed doctrine. If it’s going to destroy us, I don’t want it. 

I gave up on those booklets and all their teachings. But I was an empty shipwreck. I had tried to fly before I was ready and had come crashing down out of the sky. In the wake of this horrible time in my life was a trail of hurt feelings and broken friendships. 

I was still searching for truth, though. And through a friend I was introduced to Darin Hufford’s website. I’ll be honest, I read a few articles and my first thought was, this guy is a heretic. I thought he was crazy. But I wanted to give him the benefit of a doubt. So I really thought about what he was saying, and then, in an instant, I understood his heart. I got what he was trying to get across to people. From there, God did the miraculous and began to change my heart. I had dropped all pretenses and decided to just be what I was, where I was. 

I am thankful to say that most of those friendships survived and my wife and I are stronger and more in love than we’ve ever been. She and I are on the same page and nothing in this world makes me more thankful than that.

 As painful as this experience was, I think it was a very valuable lesson that I needed to learn. It reminds me a lot of much of the Old Testament. The Hebrew nation was invited to a relationship with God, instead they told Moses to go up to the mountain and get God’s commandments and then they would do whatever Moses told them to do. In the same way, instead of letting God lead me to truth and to Himself, I gave that over to a bunch of booklets and to people whom I had never met. 

Since then, I have learned many truths about God, and who He is, and yet, there is so much more to learn. I’ve learned that we are all on a journey, somewhere. 

“Not all paths lead to God, but God can use any path to find you” ~ The Shack