A Rant!
Posted by: Lex on: January 5, 2007
- In: church| frustration| rant
- Comment!
OK, here’s where I am today. It’s not eloquent. It’s a rant. So deal.
I just got off the phone with a friend of mine who I believe will be a friend for life, unlike many “friends” I feel like I have lost as a result of many things, not the least of which is this journey I’m on to figure out what I believe. I’ve lost some friends as in gone forever, yep, it’s over, she’s nutz, lost; and I’ve lost others in the, we’ll stick around and just talk about safe topics because she’s off her rocker on the stuff that will save her soul from hell fire. To both groups of people I say, good riddance!! If anyone else would like to join the party, please jump on board post haste. The ship is sailing.
GOD in heaven forbid that I have chosen to think for my damn self with regard to what I believe!! I don’t understand why people, correction, Christian church-goers, get their drawers so up in a bunch over my struggle, my journey. I don’t care if you used to look up to me. I don’t care if I was the one who used to teach you. I don’t care if I have some amazing power to influence you. NEWS FLASH: I shouldn’t!!! Adults should think for themselves. Oh, wait. I forgot, that’s forbidden by the Church. No individual, free-thinkers allowed. Only absolute, zombie conformists. Only parrots who can quote the pastor and the Bible verbatim…never mind the fact that they have no clue what either meant by said quote.
I just got into this discussion about how I should be careful who I share my thoughts with because I wouldn’t want to “cause anybody to stumble”. Listen, if you ask me, “Lexi, what church do you go to these days?” and I respond, “I don’t go to church right now, I’m trying to figure out what I believe about all that. I’m sure about God, but church is up in the air for me,” and you respond by, say, dropping out of church to wander around aimlessly trying to figure out what you believe about church since that’s what’s Lexi’s doing, then you’re an idiot. I’m not responsible for your choice. Christian church-goers, pull up a chair. Listen closely. ADULTS HAVE BRAINS. They should use them. Should they chose to let their brain function lie dormant and be led around by sermons and books and people who express a dissenting opinion, without running these ideas though their thought factory, their resulting choices are NOT the fault of the person whose thoughts they have hijacked. ADULTS ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR THEMSELVES. Geez, Louise!!!
Have I mentioned before that I am frustrated as hell that the church seems to be a place where everybody is expected to think the same way and be the same way? Well, if not, I just did. It makes me so angry. God didn’t make us all different for us to spend our lives trying to figure out how to UN-do his creativity and diversity. Give me a break!!! Be your own person, for the love of GOD!!! I am not responsible for YOU. There are about 15 people on the planet who need to get that through their heads.
Do you know what I love most about where I am. I have a chance to sit on my living room floor, buck naked if I want to, and try to figure out ME and God. Nobody else. I don’t have to be concerned about X and Y’s marriage, X’s infidelity, whether A and B are having pre-marital sex, whether or not C and D are going to tithe off of that huge bonus check C just raked in, whether in Bible study we need to focus on prayer lives (since D, E, F and G are struggling so much in that area), or if we should focus on gifts and callings (since H, I, J and K are ready to step up to walk in their calling). I’m so glad to have a relationship with God that has nothing to do with telling other people how to live their freaking lives. Does anybody else know what that feels like? What it looks like? If so, let me know. And give me the address to your church if, in fact, that’s where you learned to be so….I don’t know…..normal?
How about this? If I drink, curse, dance, decide not to be celibate, decide not to attend church or whatever the sin du jour is, SO WHAT??? My sins or lack thereof are between me and GOD. Guess what? I sinned when I was a pastor too!! NEWS FREAKIN’ FLASH!!! Don’t quote bible verses to me. I KNOW THEM ALL . I taught them to YOU. Release yourself of the need to worry about me. If you believe HALF of what you say you believe, I hope it’s the half that includes the fact that GOD is bigger than YOU and he is so much more capable of handling me than you are. LET. HIM. Return to the business of what color tie to wear on communion Sundays or some other world-changing shit. I’m sorry to curse on this blog, but I’m mad and God already heard mE curse on my other blogs, so too late.
I never wanted to use this blog to defend myself, so I hope to heaven that this is the last such post, but for the record….here is where I am:
I. BELIEVE.GOD. I haven’t turned my back on him or backslid [insert tongues and sarcasm]. I even hold the Bible in some regard (and yes, I’m still trying to figure out what that is), BUT (and I do mean a BUT as big as the one I sit upon) I think the Church has gotten TONS of what it says WRONG!!! I’m tired of feeling like I had to fit in a box that I knew had things, many things wrong with it, and worse, like I was responsible for cramming that down someone else’s throat. I won’t do it anymore and I.WON’T.GET.BACK.IN.THE.BOX just because it will make people more comfortable with me. If you’re uncomfortable with me, stop talking to me like the rest of them. I’ve decide I won’t miss you. The truth is I can’t. You weren’t my friend anyway, just the friend of the girl who tried to live in the box and play the part everybody would accept. Lexi is done with that. If you can handle Lexi, call me. If not, it’s been real.
Peace.
7 Responses to "A Rant!"
January 11, 2007 at 5:18 pm
Hey, Lady
I definitely agree with you that at the very least the Bible is a great idea! Of course this is how people should be treated. I believe it’s more than that, but I definitely like how you characterize it.
I started out AME, then Pentecostal, then nothing (for years), then independent non-denominational (evangelical for all intents and purposes).
I’m glad to see that you’ve settle down after your own personal journey. I’m glad I haven’t scared you off too.
Thanks for the well wishes.
Check in on me every now and then. 
January 11, 2007 at 6:48 pm
I don’t scare that easy and like I said your journey is personal and has absolutely nothing to do with me. However if you ever need a sounding board or just a non-judgemental ear, I’m here.
August 6, 2007 at 10:14 pm
Community is a concept that I have been trying to wrap my head around. I believe in the Bible, I belive that Christ died for us and I believe that one day I will rule with Him in Heaven. I know that you question. What I do not believe in is organised religion and I suspect that is where you are in your journey.
I think that organised religions and churces try to box God in. I listen to part of your rant- the part about preaching for ABCDEFGandX&Y and I think that that is where organised religion got it wrong. We always think we know more than God and want to dictate how the show should be run, instead of listening to the quiet voice of God and how he wants things to be done.
Being a Christian does not have a nice, neat formula, more and more I am realising that God does not want to operate according to rote which most organized faiths teach. In fact in the Bible, Moses got punished by God for striking the rock the second time to produce water for the people, instead of listening to the changing command of God to answer the same situation (being the thirst of the people).
There is an aspect to God that will never change, but to me all that He desires is our obedience to His will, not our conformation to some church.
You are unrealistic when you do not expect your actions to not infuence others around you especially those who you may have had responsibility for in your “church world”. That is simply human nature, even if we say it should not have affected them as much as it did. That is why we all try to live our lives in such a way that we do not affect others negatively by our actions- we drive safely, we teach our children right from wrong, etc). In essence we are responsible to our neighbors. What you now need to evaluate is whether your actions were responsible to the others around you. And that is where reach back to this thing called community. It is after all written “it is not good for man to be alone”. Many people use this in the context of marriage and there is that application also, but we all live in a framework of people and communities and spheres of influence and every day we decide how our actions whether personal or public will affect them. Did you?
And please do not think me judgemental, far from. If you have questions about some of your beliefs, I think that by all means you should explore them, but were you judicial (and this has nothing to do with your rights, because you are fully entitled to go about your path in any way you see fit. But being in the right has little to do with being right) in going about your journey in such a public forum.
I wish you well, I pray that you find the answers that you seek and at the end of the day you find Him and yourself and the person that He has desires you to be.
August 6, 2007 at 11:14 pm
@ Yan
Thank you for your comments. I really appreciate them. A few things…
I believe there is a difference between being responsible to my neighbors and responsible for them. I believe, whether others will agree or not, that I was often asked to take responsibility for choices that were someone else’s responsibility. Very much like the situation you describe in the second paragraph, I felt the pulpit was viewed as the place to go to for all the answers. I think that’s ridiculous and undue pressure upon those in the pulpit, not to mention a misuse of the same.
Did I consider how my personal decisions affected those around me? Yes, absolutely, to my very own detriment. I stayed in a horrible situation, putting my own life at risk, for the sake of how my choice to leave the situation might affect those around me. I think that was extremely unhealthy for me, and unhealthy for the church as well. I’m afraid that far too many people are living a lie from the pulpit (as I was with respect to what was happening in my personal life) because the church expects that, in the name of “being responsible to one’s neighbors”. I think that’s wrong.
You refer to me going about my journey in such a public forum. I’m not sure if you’re referring to this blog or the pulpit. I make no apologies for what I say here on my blog. Anyone who reads this does so by choice. This is my platform to work out my questions and get feedback. I won’t give that up for anyone. If you meant the pulpit, this journey began long after I left the church and public ministry.
Thanks again for stopping by.
November 4, 2007 at 11:17 pm
BRAVO! BRAVO! BRAVO! I hope you don’t mind me including this one in my blogroll? I would not change a word! You keep your anger about the state of the church… I believe it to very healthy. It is so hard to find a group of believers that actually believe what the Bible “actually” teaches anymore. I know of only one church in my city that comes close to teaching the truth and only one radio ministry that comes close. It’s a sad state and a shame… I know.
November 4, 2007 at 11:53 pm
@ foundapotheosis
I’m a little tickled that you liked this post. I come back here and read it often. Writing it was cathartic. Just when I think I have something new to be angry about with regards to the church I read this post and think, “nope, I said it all.”
The church is in a very sad state. I don’t believe for a second that it comes close to anything Jesus talked about.
January 11, 2007 at 12:06 am
Well Lex, I don’t know you personally therefore, I can’t form an opinion on your sanity, however I have been in your shoes. Initially I just thought it was the Baptist Church that I couldn’t conform to, so I became AME. That didn’t work either, so I left the church all together to find out why I was Christian. Not because that was the way I was raised but for myself did I believe in Christ ressurected. I studied not only christianity but judiasm, taoism, islam, buddhaism, you name I read about. I stood flat foot in the middle of my bedroom and had a one on one with God, like you, I never stopped believing that He was real, and I asked for clarity. I do now belong to a church, do I take everything my pastor says as the be all end all, HELL NO!!! If I have a question, I don’t go to him, I go to God, I pray about it and search the Bible and my heart for the answer. Do I believe the Bible, yes. If, God forbid, it is all a lie, I believe that God, being the awesome God that he is, will allow for human ignorance, I find that the Bible is a basic guide. There is nothing in the bible that is not relevant. By that I mean, why wouldn’t you want to obey the Ten Commandments, why wouldn’t you want to give thanks to the creator, why wouldn’t you want to be good and kind to your fellow man. God instilled in us emotions and common sense. You right now are on a journey that no one else can finish but you. What ever conclusion you come to is a profoundly personal one. And like you said, those who truly love you will continue to love you and respect you for daring to be an individual. I personally would consider it a joy to have someone say, I don’t know than to profess that they know it all. Best wishes on your journey.