Thank You Hurt…I’m Better Sense I Faced You!

The pastor has instructed the congregation to turn to their neighbor and declare, “Your joy is coming in the morning.” You silently sigh in disgust because, one, you do not know the person next to you, and, two, you are not in the mood to talk. You are in church to get your weekly dose of the truth and go back to life as usual. Besides, you are not far enough into the church service to be convinced of the words just yet. Reluctantly, you stare into the distance and repeat the words in the direction of your neighbor, avoiding lengthy eye contact. Since you are less than enthusiastic, you are somewhat turned off by your neighbor’s theatrics and loud delivery of the good news. You think to yourself, “She is yelling too loud and squeezing my hand way too tight. It does not take all of that.”
Just when you think you are done with the awkward interaction, the pastor tells you to turn to your other neighbor and prophesy, “God is going to bless you real good.” Determined to show some life this time, you put on a big smile and gather up some energy to encourage the other person. You find your seat as you complete the prophecy and clap to show your agreement. All the while, you sit thinking that God is able to do great things for others, not for you. You sit through the sermon trying to convince yourself of the pastor’s words amid all the reasons you are thinking of why God should not bless you. You try to believe in His mighty power for your life, like the people in the front of the church, but you are unsuccessful. Contrary to the sermon, you continue to think of reasons why God should not bless you real good. You remember things you’ve done in your past and things you have done recently. The night season of your life seems inevitably longer than it is for everyone else. Once again, you walk away from church content because you have attended out of tradition, however, you walk back into the defeated life you were living before you left home this morning.
Maybe this is your story, maybe it’s not, but it was mine for a very long time. I attended church regularly but I struggled to believe that God would do anything special for me. I enjoyed the sermons, loved the choir and sung most songs with them (from my seat), went to the altar for prayer many times, and I did my best to do things people told me I needed to do. I felt I made the necessary sacrifices and said the “right” prayers for God to allow windows to open on my life. I thought I had done enough but nothing seemed to change on the inside. Outwardly, I appeared to have it together but I still felt lost, unhappy, and very miserable spiritually. Eventually I reasoned within myself that God could do great things for His people but not me. I convinced myself that His blessings of abundance were for the elite and elect men and women of God. His special blessings were definitely not for me because I was not among the spiritually elite.
I also felt that I was a failure to God because I lied to Him so many times. I cannot remember the number of times I told God the famous “if-then” prayers. “God, if you do this for me, then, I will do that for you.” Each time, He held His end of the deal but I came up short the majority of the time. He had to be tired of my lies, so, I convinced myself that I needed to be satisfied with just being saved. He loved me enough to keep me out of hell but I probably would not experience His peace, joy, or the many other benefits He gives to His children. I slowly became comfortable with this thinking because I noticed I had a lot of company. I knew many people who were just like me – they could quote scripture in a moments notice but their lives did not seem to reflect the scriptures. We all showed up to church looking and smelling like new money but we all went home to very poor lives: no peace, no dominion, no joy, and warped ideas of unconditional love.
I heard many stories about church people, some of whom held positions of authority, in various churches. I was more and more convinced that my hopes of being “happy” were not going to happen as I learned about things they were either doing or going through. I remember hearing about the divorce of a couple of high profiled televangelists. I cried and was deeply saddened by the news because I feared for my own marriage, which was always on the brink of ending. Besides, I looked up to many of these people, spiritually. I did not stand a chance if they were struggling to live a life in God’s perfect will.