Doing the God and Gigs devotional challenge based on the book by Allen C Paul called Your Art God’s Heart and wow the question “Where are you ?” Opened up a deluge of questions for me.
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Spiritually I realized:
I am tired of going to churches with arrogant, rude, know it all pastors, that just look at people like a data point. To be fair at somepoint,church is a business and no one person can pour into everyone 🤷🏾♀️ I just sincerely dislike the intellectual laziness and false promises that churches make. It really isnt all their fault. I mean seminaries give pastors, a false since of rightness. Like some how things written 2000 years ago, are going to account for every nuance in the human experience since Jesus died. The church, especially large churches become these cults where you cant question reality.
I am tired of a forced Christian relationships. For women especially there really isnt a world outside of the church, that we should engage. Alot of the theology is based on farm culture, with strict gender roles where the women just hang with women. This has made self acceptance and community hard for me. I dont want to talk about kids and marriage, all the time just because I am a woman. I am business woman,an intellectual and an artist. I am so tired of the focus in the church on ONLY family. I think alot of family issues could be solved if individuals focused on healing personal trauma, eating healthy, taking care of their bodies, and stop the steady diet of guilt and shame peddled by the American church.
Then lets get into theology. Again because the Bible is mostly based on farm culture and then you add this extra elemnt of prosperity gospel, it constantly feeds this transcational view of God. I often feel like if I dont pray, read my Bible, attend church and tithe regardless of how I am doing mentally or physically, God isnt going to protect or love me. However, I did that and watched others do that and they suffered from Depression, and serious health conditions.
I am far from a perfect person, but I am vaulable beyond just being a mindless church member. I am also tired of pretending that the church for 45 years hasnt manipulated, lied, abused, rejected and abandoned me. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing expecting different results. Do I love Christian community and Yeshua ? Yes. I just like my community intimate centered on common values of excellence, kindness, integrity and critical thinking skills.
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